


Alternity

by Spamberguesa



Category: X-Men (Movies), X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crack, Gen, Genius Loci, Nightmares, accidental organ theft, alcoholic sleep aids, and a tiny bit creepy, and stupidly overprotective, at all, basement of evil, battle at the center of the mind, bread is important okay, but marie is even worse, but they're possible, charles is a genius but that's hardly a surprise, clarice is in deep deep shit, crouton wars are serious business, death and resurrection are not without consequences, don't even ask about erik and kitty because i seriously have no idea, erik is the other's nightmare, god help the other, half-assed espionage, historical mutant experimentation, i know you mean well but fucking hell do you suck at it, inappropriately timed children's songs, it has no idea what it's in for, it totally is, kittens make everything better, kitty and magneto make a terrifying team, kitty is an awesome wingman, kitty isn't a doctor but she's the next best thing, living dead girls, logan and rogue are adorable, logan can actually cook, logan can be bizarrely sweet, logan is a stubborn bastard, logan is a terrifying driver, marie can be overprotective too okay, mental badassery, nor do the living, poor magneto is not going to have a good day, profane bedtime stories, reconciliations do not happen overnight, sharley honey you suck at reassurance, spiders make awesome projectile weapons, spiritual possession, the dead do not rest easy, they are both so goddamn weird, things that go boom, this still isn't a horror story i swear, time travel tense trouble, too bad the universe hates her, who the hell am i kidding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-25
Updated: 2015-02-27
Packaged: 2018-02-18 17:03:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 46
Words: 209,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2355926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spamberguesa/pseuds/Spamberguesa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Logan's not the only one to go back in time. Kitty, Rogue, Storm, and Blink have all been hurled into the past as well, and will wreak their own havoc on the timeline -- whether they want to or not.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. It Begins

**Author's Note:**

> I had to wonder just what would have happened if Kitty had actually been the one sent back in time, as she was in the comics. That led to a plot bunny wherein all the ladies were chucked into 1973, because let’s face it, the movie was seriously short on estrogen. Also Rogue, because I love Rogue, and missed her presence.
> 
> While this might not be unadulterated crack, it’s still in no way meant to be taken seriously.

Logan was the one who was supposed to be sent back. Clarification, Logan’s _mind_ was meant to be in 1973, and Kitty was the one who was theoretically putting him there. She certainly was not supposed to be flailing through the air, the roof of a large building growing swiftly -- and lethally -- bigger in her view.

“Fuuuuu--!”

\--

Clarice staggered, totally disoriented, until she slammed into a wall and nearly cracked her head open. This was not how her portals worked, dammit. One moment she’d been outside the temple-turned-hideout in China at night; the next she was under a clear blue sky, the sun warm on her shoulders. It smelled like city -- car exhaust, hot pavement, with a touch of fresh-cut grass from some nearby lawn. 

She looked around wildly, her first instinct wondering if the Sentinels were somehow behind this -- oh God, was she dead? Was this some fucked-up version of the afterlife?

A mosquito landed on the back of her hand and chowed down, which was probably a good sign she wasn’t dead. But if she was alive, where the hell was she?

\-- 

Anybody who bothered to pay attention would have been surprised at the appearance of a very small, very brief, very localized thunderstorm. They would have been even more surprised to see a woman come sailing out of it, landing unsteadily in the middle of an alley. 

Ororo blinked, automatically crouching in anticipation of an attack. The closest thing she received came in the form of a small black-and-white cat, who gave her knee a disinterested sniff and moved on. Somewhere on the street beyond, a car backfired, and she jumped, the air around her crackling with electricity. The cat yelped, and shot her a dirty look.

What. The. Hell.  
\--

Rogue had not been having a good day. She hadn’t had a good day in what felt like eternity. The scientists had literally kept her in a cage, drugged more often than not, taking her out only to steal more samples of her DNA. 

So she was incredibly startled to suddenly find herself upside-down in a tree. Her grey T-shirt, which was unfortunately filthy, was bunched up under her armpits, and one leg of her equally dirty sweatpants was caught on a branch. The suppression collar around her neck was partially stuck behind one ear.

What.

The drugs sometimes made her hallucinate, but this was much too vivid. There was no way she was imagining such a hot summer day, in a world that hadn’t existed in years. Something had happened, and she’d damn well better find out what, before somebody assumed she was an escaped lunatic and called the cops on her.

Getting down from the tree was easier said than done, and it wasn’t helped by the fact that she was weak with hunger. She needed food and clean clothes, and preferably a shower. For the first time since before the war, she actually felt hope.

\--

Logan was also not having a good day.

The Professor had said he was a very different man in 1973, but he’d neglected to mention _how_ different. Seeing him this way, a bitter, strung-out junkie, was just _wrong_. And Hank...Logan didn’t even know where to start with Hank. Even the school was so far from the place he’d known, and he was growing steadily crankier.

Peter _really_ wasn’t helping. If it weren’t for the fact that they really did need the kid’s help, Logan would have happily slapped him upside the head, and he got the distinct impression the Professor would, too. Which was also weird as hell.

He was so annoyed that, for once in his life, he wasn’t paying nearly as much attention as he ought. Which was how he almost ran right over Rogue.

She shrieked, slamming her hands down on the hood and jumping, as though she somehow thought it would help. Everyone in the car screamed, too -- except for Logan. He just swore, stomping on the brakes and slapping the car into park. He was out the door before it had even stopped moving.

“Marie? Marie?!”

She gave him a tired, slightly vacant grin. She looked like hell, her clothing filthy and hair matted, with one of those damn suppression collars around her neck like a weight. “Hi Logan. Small world.”

“ _Jesus_.” He brushed the hair back from her face, checking her over for injuries. She was dirty and malnourished, but didn’t appear to be otherwise harmed. How the hell was she here? Even if there was someone else with Kitty’s powers, someone who could send another person’s consciousness back in time, Marie hadn’t been born in 1973. And this was Marie -- you could fake appearance, but you couldn’t fake scent, and she still smelled like Marie under all the grime.

“Change of plan,” he said. “Peter, you’ve got a twin sister, right? She’s what, at college?”

The boy nodded, slightly bewildered but mostly uneasy. The kid might be an asshole, but he wasn’t a monster, and he’d probably never seen anything like the sight Marie now presented.

“Come on, Marie,” Logan said, as gently as he was capable of (which, admittedly, wasn’t much). “Let’s get you cleaned up.”

Marie blinked at him, but said nothing, and didn’t protest when he helped her into the car. It was a squeeze to get her between him and Charles, but she’d always been small, and now she was criminally underweight. 

“Marie, you might not believe this, but this is the Professor,” he said, tires squealing as he pulled a hard U-turn. “Professor, this is Marie. She’s one of your students in the future, and I have no idea how the hell she got back _here_.”

“I don’t, either,” Marie offered. She was sitting hunched in on herself, almost curled into a ball, and Logan rested a hand on her head. “Better here than there.”

He believed her. He didn’t want to ask where she’d been, because he thought he could guess easily enough. _How_ she’d gotten here didn’t matter at the moment -- the point was that she was here, and he had to make damn sure nothing more happened to her. 

Which probably meant they had to bring her with them. Shit. Somehow, the thought of her meeting Magneto -- even a younger Magneto -- did not seem like a good idea. They had to get that damn suppression collar off her, but if she were to see him now, in her current mental state...well, Logan wasn’t sure she wouldn’t snap and try to kill him.

Motherfucker. As if this wasn’t complicated enough.

\--

Clarice, though she now had more information, was no less confused than she’d been.

She’d done a little poking around, creeping down the sidewalk, trying to blend in and utterly failing. With her uniform, hair, and eyes, there was nowhere she _could_ have blended in, but in this slice of suburbia, she didn’t have a chance.

The cars and clothes were very...Seventies. She’d thought _That 70's Show_ had exaggerated, but no, it really was _that_ bad. The only logical -- well, sort of logical -- conclusion she could draw was that she’d somehow followed Logan. 

Except Logan was only _mentally_ here. There was no way, so far as she knew, that she could have physically traveled in time along with him. She was in a world she didn’t understand, with no money, no contacts, and no way home. Would they be okay back there, without her? God knew they needed all the help they could get, and suffered every time they lost even one of their fighters.

She had to figure out where she was, and then find a way to the school. The Professor might, as he said, be a very different man from the one she knew, but she doubted he’d turn her away. It was the only safe haven she could think of.

\-- 

Unknown to either Clarice or Ororo, they weren’t actually very far from one another. The latter had found a phone book, and discovered it was only a few hours’ drive to Westchester. Since she had no money for either bus or cab, she figured it would be best to wait until dark, and fly her way there.

She’d spent so long in the ruined future that she’d forgotten what the world had been like, before. Having ditched her cape and the more obvious portions of her uniform, she sat now in a park, in the shade of a massive oak tree. Here, people just...went about their daily business. There was no terror, no danger but that which ordinary human beings faced from one another, and it was beyond jarring. The children who played on the jungle gym were happy and clean and well-nourished, laughing with a careless joy she’d long forgotten. Logan might have been the one sent back to ensure their eventual fate wouldn’t happen, but Ororo would be damned if she wouldn’t help as much as she was able.

She just had to get to the school.

\--

Kitty was not a happy camper.

She’d phased right through the roof and straight down into the floor -- far enough that she had a fair chore getting back out. Fortunately, nobody seemed to have seen her, though that was probably because she came back up into a bathroom. Hooray.

She straightened her hair and clothes before she went out the door, trying to shake her disorientation. It didn’t take long for her to discover she’d landed in the goddamn Pentagon, which momentarily made her panic -- she didn’t have a visitor’s pass, and she was pretty sure that they’d been strict about that kind of thing even in the Seventies.

Magneto was somewhere in here, but like hell was she going to get him out on her own. The Magneto she knew might be on their side, but with everything she’d heard about his younger self, she didn’t trust him as far as she could throw him -- and she certainly didn’t want to try to manage him on her own. If he decided to run off and do something stupid, she had no way of stopping him short of killing him, which would screw the whole thing up. 

No, she’d wait for Logan and whoever else he brought. She probably had a lot of downtime ahead of her, so she might as well do a little digging into what the Pentagon of this time knew about mutants. 

It was easy enough to phase through a wall just long enough to steal someone’s pass, but she was hardly going to pass unnoticed while wearing all this black leather. She’d have to find someone roughly her size, and mug them for their suit.

Who knew. This might even be fun.

\--

Rogue had forgotten just how wonderful a hot shower felt.

She stayed in a good twenty minutes, sluicing the filth and sweat from her skin, scrubbing her hair three times before she was satisfied it felt clean. The boy, Peter, had given her his sister’s bathrobe and some of her clothes -- including a pair of leather gloves. The first thing Logan had done, when they reached the house, was rip her suppression collar in half, and stomp on it for good measure. He’d been far more adamant about its removal than she had, since she was well aware just how deadly her skin was without it.

Even so, it was nice not having it hanging around her neck like a lead weight. Wrapped up in the softness of the bathrobe, she toweled off her hair, and set about the rather annoying task of trying to brush it out. Her reflection showed a face that was far too thin, her cheekbones standing out like razors, but she was alive, and she was free.

Someone rapped on the door. “You about done in there, Marie? We gotta head out soon.”

She sighed, squeezing the last of the water from her hair. She could brush it in the car, she supposed, while they drove...wherever they were going.

“Where exactly are we headed?” she asked, grabbing the clothes Peter had given her. His sister was taller than her, and not an emaciated waif, so they were a bit big, but they’d do. She cinched a belt around the waist of the jeans (very wide bell-bottoms, she noted), cuffing the hems. The button-down shirt, which was a rather loud paisley print, hung on her like a tent, but it covered her poison skin, and the gloves at least fit very well.

“The Pentagon.”

Marie opened the door, giving him a dubious look. She debated asking why, but decided there wasn’t much point. She’d find out soon enough, and she’d bet the explanation was something insane anyway.

“All right, then. I’m good to go.”

Logan shoved a very thick sandwich into her hands. “Try not to get crumbs all over the upholstery. And eat that whole thing, you’re too damn skinny.”

He stalked out before she could say anything. She cast the young man who was apparently the Professor a helpless look, but he just shrugged. With Logan, there really wasn’t much else you could do.

She tore into the sandwich even as she followed them out, trying not trip in her slightly too-large shoes. At this point, she really didn’t care what they were doing. She was clean, free, and she had food -- nothing else particularly mattered. 

\--

Even though this was the Seventies, Clarice still didn’t think trying to hitchhike was a great idea. Wasn’t there some serial killer out there right now, who preyed on hitchhiking young women? Granted, anyone who tried to kill her would be in for a world of hurt, but still. She’d rather not risk it. 

She also didn’t want to wait until dark, so once she’d figured out where she was, she portaled her way through a succession of back alleys and empty warehouses. It might not be much faster than walking, but it gave her something to _do._ Using her powers reminded her that, no matter how weird her surroundings, or how they’d come to be her surroundings, she was still Blink, dammit. She was a mutant, and a warrior by necessity if not by choice, and she was not totally at the mercy of the world around her.

Occasionally she did pause, just to smell the air. Yes, it stank like air pollution, but it was still much cleaner than it had been in the time she’d left. There was no greasy, nauseating stench of decay, no stink of burning rubber or smoke from the ever-present fires in the camps.

Unfortunately, paying attention to the air meant she wasn’t paying attention to the rest of her surroundings, and she accidentally portaled herself right in front of a delivery van.

Oops.

\--

In the Pentagon, a small woman was currently banging on the door of a storage cupboard very far down. Another, even smaller woman, who now wore her clothes and ID badge, was rifling through records in a dusty office.

Kitty had picked this room because it was behind a lot of security: anything guarded that closely _had_ to be worth investigating. There were no cameras in here -- thank God for this technological Dark Age -- so she was free to make as much of a mess as she wanted.

She sat on the floor, her uncomfortable high heels beside her. To her surprise, there was very little about mutants in any of the files -- there were conjectures about what had happened in Cuba in 1962, but it seemed that most people didn’t believe mutants as a species even existed.

There was plenty on Magneto, though. It figured nobody had thought to mention that he was in prison for _shooting JFK,_ for Christ’s sake. Most of his history was listed in these files, and Kitty found herself feeling sorry for him, until she remembered that this was the fuckstick who almost sacrificed Rogue like some kind of divine offering. His early life might have been hell, but that didn’t change the fact that he’d tried to murder her friend. The more she read, the less she wanted to break him out, but his older self and the Professor wouldn’t have said they needed him if they didn’t.

The youngest picture they had of him was as a ten-year-old boy in a concentration camp, his head shaved, his eyes hollow and almost dead. If his life had been different -- if his parents had survived, and he’d never gone to the camp -- would he still have grown up to be such an asshole? She didn’t think that kind of superiority and arrogance were all learned behaviors. If the Professor had gone through the same thing, Kitty doubted he would have turned out like Magneto. There was an innate goodness in the Professor that she didn’t think could be kept down for long.

She checked her stolen watch. It was mid-afternoon now; if Logan and the young Professor didn’t turn up soon, they wouldn’t be getting anybody out today. It might be a good idea for her to take another look around.

\--

Logan was terse and silent as he drove, but he doubted Peter was capable of shutting up for more than a minute at a time. The kid certainly didn’t seem to be able to sit still, but that was probably just part of his mutation. He was jabbering at Marie, who was looking increasingly uncomfortable.

“So you’re from the future, like he is? How’d you get here? Where did you come from?”

She glared at him so fiercely that he actually leaned away. “I came from hell, and I dunno how I got here. Don’t you ever shut up?”

Logan snorted before he could help it. “No, he doesn’t. Give her a break, will you? If I told you everything about our future, you’d shoot yourself.”

He caught Peter’s doubtful expression in the mirror, but amazingly, the boy said nothing more.

“Is it really that bad?” Hank asked.

“Worse,” Marie said, before Logan could respond. “Worse than you can imagine. Just what are we doin’ now, anyway?”

Logan fought a grimace. How to tell her this? “We’re breakin’ someone outta prison,” he said. “Professor -- our Professor, the old one -- said I have to, and Marie, you’re not gonna like this. We’re bustin’ out Magneto.”

“ _What?!_ ” The word was more snarl than shriek, but it still made him wince. “ _Why?_ ”

Charles shifted, uncomfortable but obviously curious as well. “You have a history with him, in the future?” he asked, looking like he fully realized how weird that sounded.

“He tried to kill me,” she growled, unconsciously fingering the white streak in her hair. “Why in _hell_ do we need him?”

“To stop Mystique. Marie, I know you don’t wanna hear this, but you can’t just go killing him, all right?” The Marie he had known wasn’t a killer, but she’d been through hell, and he didn’t know just what it might have done to her.

“Who said anything about _killing_ him?” she muttered, glaring at nothing.

In spite of himself, Logan almost smiled. She was still a fighter, but not a murderer. She was still Marie. “Slug him if you have to, but don’t suck all the life out of him. Doubt you want him in your head again.”

“That’s for damn sure,” she said, and winced. “Once was enough.”

Charles glanced from one to the other. “Are you _sure_ Erik and I are friends in the future?” he asked, disbelief etched across his face.

“Believe it or not, he’s not an asshole when he gets old. Being hunted like dogs makes a pretty big shift in priorities, and it makes some strange friends.”

Marie shuddered, and he wished he hadn’t said anything. Whatever was ahead of them probably wouldn’t be easy for her, but she’d weather it.

\--

Kitty tried to look like she belonged there as she moved through the hallways, her high heels clacking on the tile. She fervently wished the Pentagon came with one of those ‘you are here’ maps you found at the mall, because she didn’t want to appear as lost as she actually was. Since she didn’t know what the young Professor looked like, she could only keep her eyes out for Logan, and meanwhile try not to get stepped on. Even in heels, she was shorter than most of the people around her, and she knew her borrowed suit had to look comically large on her.

A tour group was approaching, the usual mix of tourists and schoolkids, and she stood aside to let them pass. She’d seen four such groups since she left her office hideaway, and searched each carefully without result. This one, though...yep, there was Logan. He was kind of hard to miss. With him were three young men and -- Rogue? Holy shit, had she been thrown back here, too?

She was here, and they were going to go break out Magneto. Oh, this was not going to end well.


	2. Of Breakouts and Clown Cars

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which things quite gleefully go to hell, and attempt to come back. Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten about Ororo. She’ll turn up again soon enough. I’m playing _very_ fast and loose with geography: I live on the West Coast, and have no idea how long it would take to get between DC and the school now, let alone in 1973. It doesn’t appear to take them very long to get from the mansion to Peter’s and then to DC, so I hope I’m not too off.

Given what they were about to do, Marie was weirdly relaxed. She supposed that after everything she’d gone through in the camps, it was difficult to be fazed by much of anything. She didn’t even need to worry about trying to stay near Logan, because he was currently stuck to her like glue. 

“You’re not dressed right, to pretend you work there,” he’d told her in the car. “Once we’re inside, pretend you’re a tourist and keep an eye out, okay?”

She’d glanced around the car. Of the three men, the Professor had the only suit. Hank was meant to be playing tourist like her, and Peter could apparently run too fast to be seen, but in jeans and a leather jacket, who did Logan think he was going to fool? He knew she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself, so he probably wanted to keep her from strangling Magneto before they’d even got him out of prison. So rather than protest, all she did was arch an eyebrow to let him know she was on to his game.

He grinned at her in the rear-view mirror. She’d missed that grin. “Good,” he said. “Let’s raise some hell.”

They hadn’t raised any yet, but Peter certainly seemed to be looking forward to it. Marie couldn’t help but wonder how he’d handle the future -- if he was too fast even for the Sentinels. If everything went well, he’d never have to find out.

They hovered at the edge of the tour group, both for her sake and to make it easier for Logan and the Professor to break away unobtrusively. It made it easy for her to spot a small, familiar, so-called “employee”.

She grabbed Logan’s sleeve and tugged, pulling him out of the main group. The look he gave her was bewildered, but brief -- he recognize Kitty almost as soon as she had. 

“Hi,” Kitty said dryly, giving them a small wave. “I don’t suppose you know how I got here, do you?”

“Was gonna ask you the same thing,” Logan retorted. “If you’re here, how come I still am? Shouldn’t that be impossible?”

Kitty gave a helpless shrug. “Your guess is as good as mine. I know why you’re here, but I don’t know where _he_ is.” She edged a little closer to Marie, her stance obviously protective. It looked a little funny, coming from a person her size, but Marie knew just how deadly her friend could be, when she wanted. 

“I do,” Logan said, a little grimly. “Have a plan to get him out, but with you here, that could change.”

“What, and ruin my field trip?” Peter was actually _pouting_. “I didn’t come all this way to have somebody else pull off my you-know-what.”

In spite of everything, Marie snorted. There couldn’t possibly be any way he knew what that sounded like. 

He must have cottoned on a bit after the fact, because his face flushed a dull red. “You know what I mean.”

“No offense, Logan, but I’d rather let him have it,” Kitty said, glancing around. She lowered her voice when she added, “I’ve been poking around in here enough to know that it’ll be hard to get out, once you’re done. I’ll stay near wherever you are, and distract everybody if I can, until you’ve got you-know-who. Dragging you all through the walls with me is probably going to suck.” 

Marie had no idea just how much effort it took, for Kitty to bring passengers with her. She’d be hauling five of them out through the Pentagon, so Marie couldn’t blame her for not wanting to do it any more than she had to. “I’d feel better, with her around,” she said, knowing that would cinch the deal for Logan.

“Good. Marie, you just act like you’re her sister or something. Hank, go do your thing. Professor, Peter, let’s go -- but first, Marie, give me your hand.”

Marie eyed him warily. “What, right now? Is that really a good idea?”

“I’d rather you have my senses, if we’re gonna do this right. Now come on. Gimme.”

She removed her right glove, very reluctantly, and held out her hand. It was very small, compared to Logan’s, and he grabbed it without hesitation. He paled almost immediately, but didn’t let go until she drew a deep, startled breath.

“Good. Keep an ear out. C’mon, you two.” He all but dragged the startled Professor and Hank away, obviously in no mood to explain.

“Professor...?” Kitty said, even as the trio walked away.

“Long story,” Marie muttered, pulling her glove back on. “Seriously. We’ve got a car out there, but it’s gonna be a tight fit with everyone.” She snorted. “Maybe we could make _him_ ride on the roof.”

She couldn’t be too irritated, though. She’d forgotten what it was like, having Logan’s feral senses: she could suddenly hear the very heartbeats of the people around her, could smell an almost overwhelming combination of dozens of perfumes and deodorants. If she hadn’t already had experience with it, it probably would have been too much. Yeah, she was definitely a lot more useful a lookout like this.

Kitty tried to choke back a laugh, and failed. Marie was grateful that her friend, didn’t ask any questions, didn’t want to know where she’d been all this time. “Just don’t kill him. Professor said we need him alive.”

“That’s what Logan said,” Marie murmured darkly. “I’ve got both of you. I think I’ll be fine.”

\--

Clarice’s mood had definitely not improved. The delivery van was going slow enough that she more or less bounced right off, but she still landed on her back so hard it drove the breath out of her. And the driver -- the damn asshole -- just _kept going_. Who did that? It was such a dick move that she felt no remorse when she chased him down and portaled him right out of his ride, tossing him unceremoniously onto the pavement. Now she had a vehicle, and he probably had a concussion.

The van was a stick shift, which she had little practice driving. It took her a while to get the hang of the clutch, and it jerked and shuddered every time she tried to shift from first to second. It also probably didn’t have enough gas to get her to the school, and she still had no money to get more, but it was better than nothing. She just had to pray she didn’t get pulled over.

“So much for old-school manners,” she muttered. She’d scraped both her palms on the road, and she tried to pry the bits of asphalt out of her hands while she drove. It wasn’t easy, and it made her swerve like a drunk, so she gave up. She could take care of it when she reached the school.

How the hell was she supposed to get back to the future? And did she even want to? The answer, bluntly, was no, but she owed it to them to try. However, if the Professor didn’t know how, she doubted anyone did. There was a very real chance she was going to have to get used to living in 1973, and hope her presence didn’t set off some awful paradox.

 _Then again,_ she thought, _how exactly could you actually make things_ worse? The future was already horrible. Maybe her screwing around with the timeline could make it better, even if Logan and the Professor failed.

The thought lifted her spirits. She shouldn’t let anyone know she was a mutant -- she’d need some make-up and hair dye to pass for a human, and had to find some way to cover her ears -- and then she was going to...experiment.

\--

Rogue seemed almost preternaturally calm, but Kitty was a fizzling bundle of nerves. Which made no sense -- she’d face far worse things in the future. Potentially getting murdered by Sentinels was a lot scarier than potentially getting caught by human guards, but her instincts were screaming at her that this was about to go south. Badly.

“How long have you been here?” Rogue asked. She wasn’t even glancing around: she just leaned against the wall, arms crossed, her expression somehow serene and alert at the same time. It had to be Logan’s senses taking over.

“About eight hours, give or take. I spent a long time searching through some records. You?”

“Same. You find anything interesting?”

Somehow, Kitty doubted she’d be interested in hearing about Magneto’s fucked-up past. “Not much. It was weird to be digging through actual paper files. I can’t get over how _primitive_ it is, you know?”

Rogue snorted. “Does us a favor, though, doesn’t it? Can you imagine trying to do this even thirty years from now?”

Kitty shuddered. It didn’t bear thinking about. Oh, she could get in and out of a place in no time, but she didn’t known enough about computers and surveillance technology to avoid leaving some kind of footprint. “I just hope this is going to work,” she said. “I mean, I know you’ve been around those three longer than I have, but looking at them doesn’t give me a whole lot of confidence. Is one of those guys _really_ the Professor?”

Rogue actually grinned. “The one in the suit,” she said. “Can you believe all that hair? He doesn’t seem anythin’ like the Professor, though. I mean, not at _all_.”

Kitty blinked. No matter how much she tried, she couldn’t reconcile that guy with the Professor she knew. Sure, he’d said he’d been much different as a young man, but this went far beyond ‘different’.

Before she could say so, Rogue stiffened, her eyes widening. “Uh-oh. C’mon, I think we’ve got a problem.”

She’d hardly finished speaking before a fire alarm blared through the hallways, and the overhead sprinklers turned on. The water was so cold that for a moment it stole Kitty’s breath, plastering her her hair to her head within a few moments.

She swore, but Rogue grabbed her hand before she could do anything more than that. “Through there,” she said, pointing at the wall opposite. “Gunfire.”

Kitty groaned. Why was it that wherever Logan went, sooner or later, somebody started shooting? If she got shot over this, she was killing him before she died. At least Rogue temporarily had his healing factor.

They jumped through the wall, into an office so chaotic she doubted anyone even noticed them. Everywhere, people were trying to cover paper and typewriters, swearing so loudly she saw Rogue wince. This couldn’t possibly be the military section of the Pentagon, thank God -- actual military personnel would never freak out this badly over a little water. Okay, a lot of water, but still. 

They raced right through the next wall and down another hallway, and Kitty kicked off her useless heels as she ran. The floor was so slippery that she’d break her neck if she kept going with them, but she paused long enough to grab one. It was a better weapon than none at all.

There was another office, and two more corridors, and then they went skidding into a kitchen -- and slammed straight into the kid with the weird silver hair.

“The hell, dude?” Kitty demanded, as she actually bounced off him. She lost her grip on Marie’s hand, and accidentally whacked the kid with her shoe.

“ _Ow!_ What’d I do to deserve that?”

“Sorry,” Kitty said, only half meaning it. Jeeze, he’d really done a number on this place -- it looked like a hurricane had passed through. What had to be twenty people were lying on the floor, soaked and groaning and possibly concussed. “Did you do this?”

“Yep,” he said, and it was impossible to miss the pride in his voice. Kitty wanted to blame him, but honestly, she was a little impressed. Not that she was going to say so, since the kid was obviously a little too full of himself already.

She shoved the wet hair out of her eyes, and turned just in time to see Rogue sock a tall, dark-haired man right in the jaw. Dude had to be Magneto, if only because he was the only one she didn’t recognize. Jesus, Rogue hit him so hard he actually staggered backward, pressing a hand to his face.

“I know why he hit me,” he said, giving her a puzzled look, “but what, exactly, was _that_ for?”

“You’ll know in about thirty years,” Rogue growled.

“You tried to kill her,” Logan supplied, helpfully. “You good, Marie?” Only he would dare touch her arm like that.

“Fine. Been wanting to do that for twenty years.”

Kitty groaned. “This is great and all, but can we go now?

“Who are you?” Magneto asked, looking at her for the first time.

“The one who’s going to drag all your asses out of here, before any more goons with guns show up. Logan, Rogue, you know how this works -- everybody grab hands. I can only take you with me if you’re touching.”

It seemed like absolutely nobody liked that idea. Rogue she could understand, because even with gloves on, the poor woman was leery of touching anyone, and Logan was a surly bastard at the best of times, but the rest of them looked like children afraid of cooties.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” She grabbed the silver-haired kid’s hand. “Either get over it or stay here.”

That got them moving. The four that she didn’t know were all looking at her curiously. “Whatever you do, don’t let go,” she said. “This might feel a little weird.” She was so used to phasing through everything that she barely noticed when she passed through something, but she’d been told before now that it was extremely odd for everyone else.

Off they went, and she wasn’t the only one who slipped on the wet floor. She tried to avoid stepping on anyone, but she and Rogue were probably the only ones who did.

The sprinklers were still going strong, and it was easy enough to get lost in the crowds of evacuating tourists. Nevertheless, she led them out through walls and floor, down into the parking garage, not releasing the kid’s hand until they were all through.

“Car’s this way,” Logan said. Once again, he was far closer to Rogue that was strictly necessary, and Kitty raised an eyebrow. It wasn’t like...well, everybody...hadn’t seen that one coming for years, but still. That ought to get interesting in the new future, when they both met the older Professor.

She cast a glance at his younger self, who had evidently noticed it, too. All she could do was shrug.

“So how do you plan on getting us out of here?” one of them asked -- the youngest man, the one in the ridiculous hat. He was clutching a laughably primitive bit of machinery in his hand, complete with a long, silvery antenna. He was still blinking from his trip through the walls, his complexion a bit green. The exit was jammed with cars, and it was only a matter of time before guards started searching them for their escaped prisoner.

“Same way I got you through here,” she said. “If I’m touching it, I can phase it.”

“Fascinating,” Magneto said, and he sounded so much like Spock that Kitty dissolved into laughter. The look he gave her was entirely affronted, which only made her laugh harder.

“This was supposed to be simple,” Logan grumbled, leading them to a brown car. Crowding seven people into it was absolutely going to suck. “Get in, grab him, get out. Guess that was too much to hope for.”

 _It almost always is_ , Kitty thought, but didn’t say. She wasn’t at all surprised when he shooed Rogue into the seat beside him, with the Professor at the passenger door. That left the rest of them to crowd in somehow, which wasn’t any fun at all. Kitty might be extremely little, but Peter wasn’t short, and the guy in the hat and Magneto were both very tall. The seats were only meant for two people each, which meant she wound up squashed against the back passenger door in a very small ball. Hooray.

“Okay, guys,” she said. “Let’s go.”

\--

Clarice’s life got a little easier once she hit the freeway. She could put the van into fourth gear and let it stay there, and she’d even figured out how to turn on the radio. The sound quality was pretty poor, and crackly with static, but it was far better than nothing. Even the traffic was tame by her standards -- or at least, the standards she’d had before the future went to hell. She began to hope, cautiously, that things were truly looking up.

That hope didn’t last for long. A brown four-door something came tearing up an on-ramp as though all of hell were after it, almost plowing right into her. She shrieked, swore, and laid on the horn, receiving a middle finger in return.

Fuck _that_. She gunned the engine, wincing a little at the strange grinding sound it made -- that couldn’t be good -- and pulled up alongside the offending car, intending to tell the driver off through the open window. When she saw the driver, however, she almost swerved into the other lane. Suddenly, his driving made sense.

That was _Logan_ \-- Logan and, if Clarice wasn’t much mistaken, Rogue. How the hell had she wound up here? And where had she come from?

Clarice honked the horn again, trying to grab Logan’s attention and steer at the same time. He turned, glaring, but that glare turned to shock when he recognized her.

She grinned, and swerved away, parking the van on the side of the road. Two portals later and she’d fallen through the roof of his car -- right on top of Kitty.

“ _Ow!_ What the -- _Clarice?_ Jesus, did we all come back here, or what?” Kitty rubbed her head, trying to tug her wet hair out of one of the buckles on Clarice’s uniform.

“Beats me. God, am I glad to see you.”

“I’d be gladder if you’d get off my hair.”

“What is this, a goddamn clown car?” Logan growled. Nobody answered him, because by this point, it sort of was.

“Sorry.” Somehow, Clarice managed to squeeze herself between Kitty and a guy in the most ridiculous hat she’d ever seen. He looked confused and _incredibly_ uncomfortable -- probably because she was halfway on his lap. “Hi. I’m Clarice.”

“Hank,” he said uneasily. God, was he _blushing?_

Kitty leaned forward to peer around her. “ _Hank?_ ” she said, incredulous. “Logan, did you find Beast?”

“Sort of,” Logan said, not even bothering to hide the laughter in his voice. “Told him he’s got to be a late bloomer.”

“Apparently,” Clarice said. She’d assumed Hank McCoy had always been a blue-furred guy. “I didn’t realize mutations could be so slow to turn up.”

“Long story,” Hank said, sounding strained. “Are there any more of you out there? Because this car’s full.”

Clarice shrugged. “No idea. Until I saw you, as far as I knew, I was the only one.” Now that she wasn’t trying to steer the van, she had a chance to pick at the grit on her abused palms.

“What happened?” Kitty asked.

“You know that van I was driving? The guy I took it from _ran me over_. Didn’t even stop.”

“Logan almost ran me over,” Rogue offered.

He flinched. “Yeah, but I stopped,” he said, a little lamely, giving her shoulder a brief squeeze.

“I hope that doesn’t mean someone’s going to try to hit me, too,” Kitty muttered. “You know, three for three.”

The man on the other side of the other side of Hank gave a long-suffering sigh. He was dressed in what looked unsettlingly like either a prison uniform, or something out of a mental asylum. “I take it you aren’t here on purpose, either,” he said, and it wasn’t a question.

“Nope,” Clarice said bluntly. “Who’re you?”

“Clarice, meet Magneto,” Kitty said. “We just busted him out of prison.”

She stared. “No shit? Great. Where are we going now?”

“Yeah, where _are_ we going?” Rogue asked.

“Paris.” That was the man in the front, who sounded both weary and resigned. Clarice probably would, too, if she’d just had some random person teleport into an already-crammed car.

“Right.” The Professor and older Magneto had said something about that. She’d been too busy guarding to listen to it much, because it wasn’t like she expected to have to deal with it herself. He had to have a plane, and she just hoped it was big enough to seat them all without cramming them in like sardines.

“Can I come, too?” asked the boy sandwiched between Hank and Magneto.

“ _No!_ ” Clarice would swear that was every single person in the car.

\--

Erik had spent almost a decade trying to stave off boredom in his small white cell. Now, though, he was beginning to long for that solitude and quiet. In less than an hour, he’d been rescued by a delinquent he was very much afraid was his son, punched by an old friend _and_ a woman he didn’t know (but who he was apparently going to try to kill), dragged through the walls of the Pentagon, and jammed into a car meant for almost half the number of people who currently occupied it. 

What made it worse was that they were all mutants, so far as he knew, so by his own code he couldn’t take out his frustrations on them. The man with the muttonchops, Logan, was right: this _was_ a clown car. And Erik was afraid it was taking them to a full-blown circus.

He didn’t know what the violent woman’s mutation was, but Logan seemed almost pathologically over-protective of her. Hank he knew, but Hank came part and parcel with Charles. Teleportation was very useful, but like Peter, the girl seemed a little too young and flighty to make a decent ally. The tiny woman who ran through walls didn’t appear to be overly hostile -- yet -- but if she too was from the future, she’d have little reason to align herself with his cause. Clearly, his future self had not succeeded at uniting mutantkind. 

Once they’d dealt with Paris -- and he hoped someone would tell him just what was going on there, before they arrived -- he’d have to come up with a different approach. If they all so hated what he’d eventually become, he’d have to try to be something else.


	3. Airplane

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I’m trying not to just re-hash the movie. Accordingly, the plane ride now has three female socket-wrenches thrown into it, plus one extraordinarily over-protective Logan. Sooner or later Rogue is going to get pissed at him over it, I’m sure. 
> 
> Meanwhile, poor Magneto. Poor, poor Magneto. I’m having a little too much fun making his life hell. And I’m probably not done with that, either.

Marie was not surprised that, even in this time, the Professor had such a nice plane. She didn’t know just how wealthy he’d been before he opened the school, but considering it had once been his house, she’d figured his family had always been rich.

She noticed how carefully Logan kept himself between her and Magneto, and she had to fight not to roll her eyes. She’d punched the bastard; that was enough for her, whether Logan would believe it or not. Even with her temporarily heightened aggression (thanks, Logan), she no longer felt any pressing need to murder him. Stuck among this group, he seemed unhappy enough already. _Good._

She, Kitty, and Clarice ooched their way down the aisle, taking up seats around a small table. Even after the sandwich, she was already hungry again, but she wasn’t quite sure how to say anything about it.

Logan saved her the trouble. Without asking, he went and raided the mini-fridge near the cockpit, and slapped together another sandwich, this time cheese and turkey. Did the Professor just keep that kind of thing stocked? He’d have to change it out periodically, since turkey didn’t exactly keep forever. 

The sandwich was unceremoniously shoved into her hands. “Eat that,” Logan ordered.

In spite of herself, Marie smiled. “Thanks, Logan. Why the hell are we going to Paris?”

He sat across the aisle from them, and sighed. “We have to keep Mystique from killing the guy who invented the Sentinels,” he said. “In our timeline, she turned him into a martyr. If we stop her, the Professor -- _our_ Professor -- thinks it will change the future. Except...Kitty, if you’re here, you’re obviously not keeping my mind in this time. If I don’t wake up, how will we know if we changed the future? And what the hell will happen to all of us?”

Kitty shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know. I’ve never heard of anything like this happening. Since you don’t age, I can’t tell if it’s still just your mind here, or your future body. We might not know what’s happened to the future until we live it.”

Marie didn’t particularly like that thought, and she could tell none of the others did, either. Sure, 1973 was a massive step up from when they’d come from, but other than Logan, they were all of them in a time they didn’t belong. 

“How much do we need to worry about changing the future, otherwise?” Clarice asked. “I mean, I was thinking, if it’s so bad anyway, there have to be other things we can do to make it better, right?”

Kitty shrugged again, darting a glance backward. Magneto and the Professor were already arguing -- quietly, for now, but Marie doubted that would last. “I’d say kill _him_ , but that wouldn’t really be fair to older him. Especially if the future still sucks after we’re done messing with it. We have to find some way to stop the Sentinel program.”

“Like _we_ would ever manage that,” Clarice muttered. She had a point, too; none of them were scientists or diplomats. Sure, they’d be capable of sabotaging the hell out of any hardware they managed to find, but that would be a stopgap measure at best. Unless they managed to scrap even the idea of the program, they’d never win.

“We’ll figure out something,” Kitty said. “I mean, we sort of have to.”

The quiet bickering chose that moment to devolve into a shouting match. Honestly, it was a miracle it had taken that long. Marie, still stuck with Logan’s animalistic senses, winced at the assault on her eardrums. She couldn’t even make out what they were saying, but she didn’t need to. Magneto was evidently extremely pissed, because the plane took an abrupt nosedive.

Clarice screamed, Kitty and Logan swore, and Marie ground her teeth so hard she was surprised she didn’t crack a molar. Dropping the sandwich, she stripped off her gloves without even realizing what she was doing. Fury misted her vision red, and she launched herself at the arguing pair like...well, like an animal.

She plowed into Magneto like a linebacker, one hand around his throat. Even through her rage, she wasn’t trying to kill him -- she just needed to drain him enough to break his control of the plane. The fact that it would leave him weak and sick was merely a nice bonus.

She’d forgotten what this particular power felt like, and it brought back unpleasant memories of the Statue of Liberty, of being drained of life like water through a sieve. For a brief, horrible instant, she _did_ want to kill him, but that was before his thoughts slammed into her head.

Oh, he was angry -- even angrier than her, and that was really saying something. His personality crashed headlong into the Logan already in her mind, and she grit her teeth again. She was pissed off enough, thank you very much -- she didn’t need two other infuriated people in her head. But there was betrayal in Magneto’s thoughts, too, shockingly intense -- she hadn’t thought him capable of anything other than obnoxious superiority. That was there, too, in spades, and she was very glad he was fast losing consciousness. She saw bits and pieces of his latest almost-plan -- it was a fractured thing, because it wasn’t really a _plan_ at all; just a loose confederation of ideas. She didn’t like even what little there was to see.

Large hands closed on her shoulders, more or less gently, and pulled her backward. She lost her grip on Magneto’s throat, but she’d done what she needed to: he was still conscious, but barely, his face gone absolutely grey. She was a little too pleased to note that there was actual _fear_ in his eyes. _Good_. Now he knew what she’d felt.

“That’s enough, Marie,” Logan said, half leading/half carrying her back down the aisle. “It’s okay, now.” And, sure enough, the plane was level once again.

“Is it?” she asked, feeling a little dazed. That always seemed to happen when she grabbed someone’s power -- while it wasn’t something she often did, especially on purpose, the immediate aftermath always made her feel like she was drunk. Now she had Magneto’s confused rage, Logan’s inhuman senses, and her own disorientation...

...and it felt _good_. God, what had she done? Taking somebody’s power had never been this oddly euphoric. Was it because she’d done it in anger? Marie found that pain, that terrible betrayal, almost intoxicating. The only thing that could be better was outright killing the asshole.

Logan’s hand on her hair brought her back to reality. “Yes. It’s done, Marie. He’s not gettin’ up any time soon. Come on, let’s get you settled.”

She followed, more or less placidly, because she really didn’t know what else to do. She sat beside Kitty again, automatically pulling on her gloves, and recoiled a little when Logan stuck a glass full of some amber liquid in front of her. From the smell of it, it was appallingly alcoholic, and she eyed it warily. Marie had always avoided liquor, mostly because she didn’t want to risk hurting anyone through impaired reflexes, but Logan’s expression told her that refusing it would be more trouble than it was worth.

It burned on the way down, and she almost gagged. If all hard liquor tasted like this, she wondered why the hell anyone drank it at all. Her borrowed sense of taste probably wasn’t helping, but she doubted the stuff would be much better even without such keen taste buds.

“What,” the Professor asked, a little faintly, “the _hell_ was that?”

“Marie’s mutation,” Logan said shortly. “He’ll be fine. He’ll feel like shit for a while, but he’ll be fine, and he won’t be crashing this plane any time soon.”

The Professor looked horrified, but then, he would. Sometimes, Marie was afraid he was too soft-hearted, though she knew it was just his almost endless capacity for empathy. It had to be why he’d forgiven Magneto, time and again, for so many years.

Logan gave her gloved hand a squeeze. “You good?” he asked. 

She nodded. “Somebody better make sure _he_ is, though. Hope I didn’t put him in a coma or something.” Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Part of her did hope he was out for the count, but since they probably still needed him, it would be better if she hadn’t.

Kitty sighed. “On it.” She jumped lightly over the back of the seat, moving every bit like the animal from which she took her nickname. “You just chill a while, Rogue. I’ve got this.”

\--

Kitty had to admit, Rogue’s...well, _mauling_...of Magneto had seriously freaked her out. Rogue had every reason to want to murder him, and though she’d said she wouldn’t....well, the poor woman had been to hell and back. Her old morals might not necessarily apply anymore. Kitty had never been afraid of Rogue or her powers, but she’d never seen them used like that, with such intent. Yeesh.

She approached the Professor and his prone former friend very carefully, not wanting to spook either of them. “Can I see?” she said. “I’m...sort of a medic, in the future.” She’d become so by necessity -- learning on the job, in a sense -- but she was probably as well-trained as any current combat medic, if not more so.

The Professor nodded, but he didn’t look as though he liked it. So far as Kitty knew, he wouldn’t have had much -- if any -- medical training in 1973, so he didn’t really have much choice.

She knelt beside Magneto, and winced. He really did look like hell -- Rogue hadn’t drained him entirely, but she’d done more than enough damage. His face was paper-white, his forehead beaded with sweat, and he looked just a little terrified.

“Not going to hurt you,” she said, as placatingly as she could. When she pressed her fingers to his wrist, she found his pulse was still strong, and only a little elevated. “If it makes you feel any better, future-you actually made her do that to you.”

He blinked at her, brows furrowing in confusion, but he didn’t speak. He probably couldn’t, just yet.

“Yeeeeah, future-you is a little crazy,” she said, checking his temperature with the back of her hand on his forehead. His skin was a little chilly -- possibly a sign of shock. “I mean, that you isn’t the _future_ future-you, the one I knew after the Sentinels, but from everything I’ve gathered, up until then, you were a little...weird. Professor, can you get him some of that booze Logan got Rogue?” Ideally, water would be a better idea, but with a case of shock, and the harshness of alcohol would probably be more effective.

“You really will be okay,” she said, while the Professor went to search the mini-fridge. “I know it sucks right now, but Rogue never does anybody permanent damage. Give it a few hours and you’ll mostly be back on your feet.”

The Professor handed her a glass of something incredibly pungent, his hands a little unsteady. “Here, can you help me sit him up? I don’t want him choking on this.”

Given how narrow the aisle was, that was easier said than done. She couldn’t actually get Magneto’s hand to hold the glass, which probably wasn’t a good sign. Dammit.

“You drink that whole thing,” she ordered. “ _Slowly_.” She sat back and glared at him while he sipped, daring him to refuse.

“Are you really going to sit there and watch me?” he asked. His voice sounded like it was being filtered through gravel.

“Yup,” she said bluntly. “You’re my patient until I say otherwise, so drink up.”

Behind him, the Professor actually cracked a smile. It was all Kitty could do not to return it.

Magneto glowered at her, but did as he was told. Slowly, a little color came back into his face, and he started to look less like a walking corpse. “How did she do that?” 

“It’s her mutation,” Kitty said, and didn’t offer any further information. He was a crafty son of a bitch; the less he knew about some things, the better. While they were trying to change the future, she didn’t want to inadvertently create one where he took over. “Seriously. Drink.”

He scowled. “I’m _working_ on it,” he snapped, but at least he took another sip.

That actually drew a quiet snort from the Professor, and Kitty grinned. If she could keep Magneto too annoyed to rekindle their argument, so much the better. Besides, it was just so _easy_.

\-- 

The rest of the flight was...long. Logan spent most of it hovering over Marie, to her growing annoyance. He knew he had to keep her busy, and give her mind time to sort through its recent doses of both him and Magneto, but there wasn’t a whole lot he could do in the confined space of an airplane -- even one this fancy. He was damn sure she wasn’t going to want to talk about where she’d been, or what had been done to her, so that left him with precious few options.

“Come on, just try it.”

“I’m not eatin’ that.” Marie was currently eyeing a small plate of caviar, her expression one of deep distrust. “I don’t care how fancy and expensive it is, there is no way I’m puttin’ fish eggs in my mouth.”

“I’ll do it if you will,” Clarice said, and Logan shot her a grateful look. She seemed to have picked up on his intent almost right away, though he’d put his foot down on her throwing around mini-portals. They’d already almost crashed once.

Marie looked at her, and then at Logan. “All right,” she said. “I’ll try it if you _both_ will.”

He couldn’t help but grimace, which made Clarice hoot with laughter. “What’s the matter, Wolverine? You really want us to eat something you won’t?”

Logan scowled, but the look on Marie’s face stopped him saying anything snarky. She was smiling in a way he hadn’t seen since long before the Sentinel war, her eyes alive and dancing. Well, shit. For that, he could eat a few damn fish eggs.

“Fine,” he muttered, scooping a little ( _very_ little) of the black goop up with a spoon. It tasted...well, like salt and not much else. There was a little fishy tang underneath it, but that was it. He had no idea why the stuff was so expensive. “That was a little disappointing.”

Marie picked up her own spoon, but seemed to be heartened by his lack of reaction. She still made a slight face when she tasted it, though. “ _That’s_ a couple hundred dollars a jar?”

“Yuck,” Clarice said, wiping her tongue on a cloth napkin. “Rich people are weird.”

Marie snorted, obviously trying to stifle a laugh. The sound was harsh and rusty, as though she hadn’t laughed in a long time. 

“I need to go wash this out of my mouth,” Clarice said. “Where’s the bathroom?”

“Back of the plane, I think,” Logan said. “Feel free to trip over Magneto while you’re at it.” Kitty and the Professor had managed to sit the bastard up in one of the seats, but his feet still stuck out into the aisle. Clarice was too sweet a kid to kick him, unfortunately.

Marie leaned toward him as soon as she was gone. “I don’t like what I saw in his head,” she said, so quietly that anyone without his hearing wouldn’t have heard it. “He wants to kill Mystique, but it’s more than that. He’s seen how we all react to him, all of us from the future. He wants to try somethin’ different, but since it’s _him_ , I don’t trust it to be anythin’ good.”

“I wouldn’t, either,” Logan said, just as quietly. “I wish we could just kill him.”

She snorted. “Maybe Kitty’ll annoy him to death,” she said. “You know she’s doin’ that on purpose. Looks like she’s havin’ a grand ol’ time of it, too.”

Logan grinned. Kitty did indeed seem to be having a hell of a lot of fun being an overbearing doctor, though she was also serving as a kind of buffer between Magneto and the Professor. It would be hard for them to get into any more interpersonal drama while one of them was being harangued by a tiny, ruthless medic. The Professor actually seemed to be kind of amused, but Magneto must still be a little out of it, since he just looked bewildered. Good. If he stayed that way, there wouldn’t be any murder, attempted or otherwise.

“Look, when we get to Paris, you stick near me, you hear? You’ve got my healing factor for now, but I’d rather you didn’t get shot.”

Marie gave him a slightly unimpressed look. “And I’m somehow _less_ likely to get shot if I’m close to you?” she said. “I doubt that.”

She had a point, dammit. Guards or police or whatever the hell they might encounter would be a lot less likely to pull the trigger on a pretty young woman than on, well, him. Still. “Yeah, well, I might need your help,” he said, although he really didn’t like having to admit it. “You’re the only one who can take Magneto out without killing him, if he’s even in any shape to do anything stupid when we get there. You’ve got his power now, too, for a while.” He didn’t know just how long her absorption actually lasted, but he hoped like hell she’d keep it long enough to see things through.

Marie winced. “True. All right. But don’t do anything stupid yourself, okay?”

Privately, Logan wondered if he’d ever done _anything_ she wouldn’t count as stupid in some form. “I’ll try.”

\--

Erik really needed to stop thinking his day was incapable of getting any worse.

He’d never, ever seen a mutation like the woman -- Marie’s -- before. The tiny medic might say that he’d actually voluntarily had her drag the life-force out of him in the future, but he had a very difficult time believing it. Unless he was trying to commit some kind of passive suicide, which he couldn’t imagine at all. He couldn’t remember feeling this awful since he was a child -- since Shaw’s so-called ‘experiments’.

The little medic -- Kitty, that was her name -- was happily jabbering away at the Professor, pausing only long enough to give a pointed glare at the piece of bread in Erik’s hand. She was adamant that he eat it, and that he drink water now that he was finished with his booze. Since he’d drank that entire glass of whiskey on a mostly empty stomach, the bread wasn’t doing much to absorb the alcohol, and he wondered if he was going to be able to sober up before they reached Paris. He knew what he had to do -- he didn’t _want_ to do it, but it must be done. 

And he knew that he was the only one who would. Logan, big and tough though he was, didn’t seem likely to try to kill anyone who wasn’t a direct threat to him or his. While he could, in theory, be goaded into killing Raven as an act of defense -- self or otherwise -- Erik doubted Marie would let him. The hold that woman had over him was almost disturbing. Clarice, he was sure, would take her cue from both of them, and Kitty...well, he wasn’t sure what to make of her. Even if he did manage to shoot Raven, Kitty would probably jump on her with a roll of bandages and a bottle of vodka.

“You’ve been holding that for five minutes.” Kitty’s disapproving voice broke through his thoughts. “Eat it already. I’d say try a sandwich, but I doubt you need cheese sitting on your stomach right now.”

“You’re not really a doctor,” he pointed out, his addled brain telling him that was the perfect thing to say. “You can’t be more than twenty-five.”

“I’m thirty-three,” she said flatly, “now eat your damn bread.”

Charles coughed, completely failing to choke back a laugh. How, exactly, had Erik wound up stuck with these people? Oh, he was grateful for the jailbreak, but he could really do without the rest of...this. As it was right now, he wouldn’t even be able to stagger to freedom once they reached the tarmac. Much though he disliked being ordered around by a girl who could probably fit in his pocket, he did indeed need to eat the damn bread, and try to cut through the haze of alcohol while he still had a chance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m sorry, but Kitty bossing around a totally out-of-it Magneto was just too funny not to do. While I have never tried caviar myself, a friend of mine said it really is salty and disappointing and not much else. And of course Logan would eat it if Rogue asked, because he’s Logan and she’s Rogue, and at this point he’d probably crack the moon in half if it would make her smile.


	4. A Pattern Emerges

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to Gay Paree! In which French people can’t drive, Logan is surly, a wild Mystique appears, and Magneto develops a very warped sense of humor. Also, hello again, Ororo!

The school, Ororo discovered, was completely deserted. It was a far cry from the home she knew: the grounds were overgrown, the gardens filled with weeds and the grass in desperate need of cutting. She wasn’t going to find anything here, help or otherwise.

She knew that Logan was theoretically taking the young Charles and Erik to Paris, so that was probably her next best destination. Since she didn’t have any money for a commercial flight, she was going to have to fly there under her own steam. Over the entire damn Atlantic ocean.

This had really, _really_ better be worth it.

\--

Long before they landed, Clarice was beyond ready to get off the plane.

Rogue and Logan had been deep in conversation when she left the bathroom, and she didn’t want to disturb them. She also didn’t want to interrupt Kitty’s cheerful harrassment of Magneto, so she went to bother Hank in the cockpit.

“Is there any possible way this is going to end well?” she asked, settling herself into the co-pilot’s seat. She was familiar enough with the Professor’s later jets that it was easy to work out this one’s far more primitive controls. “I mean, honestly. Look at all of us. We might be in a plane, but it’s still a clown car, know what I mean?” At least, in a place as metropolitan as Paris, her looks wouldn’t stand out quite so much. This _was_ the decade of glam rock, after all.

Hank winced. “I know. Do you think there’s any chance of leaving a few people behind when we do this?”

Clarice snorted. “Doubt it. Where Rogue goes, Logan goes, and he might literally drag her with him if it means he can keep an eye on her. Kitty won’t dare leave them to get into trouble on their own, and me? I want to see what happens. We had to have all come back here for a reason.”

“You think so?” he asked, clearly dubious.

“I have to. Otherwise I wonder what the point is.” She turned away, looking out the window. They were above the cloud cover, the sky an endless, flawless blue. Part of her wished they could stay airborne forever, if only because she really did not -- could not -- think this was going to end any other way than completely shitty. The young Professor was so unlike the man she knew that she couldn’t predict him at all, and it was the same with Hank. She trusted Logan right up until his temper gave out -- fortunately, he had Rogue around to handle that, at least in theory. Clarice hadn’t expected her to snap and attack Magneto like that, though at least she didn’t actually kill him. Magneto was...well, _him_ ; while he was a known quantity, that wasn’t a good thing. At least Kitty probably wasn’t going to try to murder anyone.

“Either you _sit down_ , or I’m gonna phase your ass into that seat and leave you there!”

Or maybe not.

\--

Years ago, the Professor had taught Marie a series of breathing techniques meant to help her relax. She’d only found meditation occasionally useful, but the breathing exercises never failed to calm her. They were possibly the only reason she hadn’t lost her mind in the camps. Things had been quiet enough to let her run through the entire gamut of them, Logan a silent, reassuring presence at her side. Though his shadow and Magneto’s were rattling around fresh in her mind, she managed to cage them both, locking them away in the mental vaults that held all the personalities she’d absorbed over the years. She shut younger Magneto away with his older self, deciding they could fight it out away from her. Logan was allowed to linger a little closer to her own thoughts.

Kitty’s yell made her open her eyes. At this point, Marie was quite certain her friend was just fucking around with Magneto because she could, but it wasn’t like there was much else to do right now. Said man was looking slightly more with it, and a good deal more annoyed, and the Professor wasn’t doing a very good job hiding his amusement at the whole situation.

“I’d be careful,” Logan called. “She probably means it. It’s always the little ones you have to watch out for.”

Kitty made a face at him. While Rogue actually wasn’t much taller than her, Kitty always had been the one that got the short jokes. It didn’t help that she looked so much younger than she actually was. “Silencio, old man,” she said, even as she shoved Magneto back into his seat. His balance was still so off that it actually worked. She stabbed a finger at him. “I mean it. You need to drink more water. I might not be a real doctor, but I’m the closest thing you’re gonna find for a thousand miles in any direction.”

Marie snorted, leaning back in her seat. While potential disaster awaited them at the end of their flight -- and she had to face it, with this group, it was probably more than ‘potential’ -- for now she felt...content. She was free, well-fed, clean, and she had Logan with her. There wasn’t a whole lot more she could ask for. 

“How’re we gonna keep him from killing Mystique?” she asked quietly. “I mean, in some way that isn’t really obvious. I know he doesn’t want to do it, but that’s not gonna stop him.” From what she’d seen in his head, they’d been...close, which was _really_ creepy. Trust Magneto to be able to kill someone he supposedly cared about, if it suited his own self-interest. She probably shouldn’t be surprised.

Logan was quiet for so long that Marie wondered if he’d even been paying attention. She wondered why, until the Logan-in-her-head said, “ _What he don’t wanna say is that maybe we should let him.”_

Marie was...not as appalled as she ought to be. She’d had a version of Logan in her head long enough to know some of the things he’d done -- and that was only the stuff he remembered. The thought would have been horrifying before she went to the camps, but her time there had hardened her into something she wasn’t sure she liked. 

“We don’t know what that would do to the future,” she said, low. “And, if we were s’posed to do that -- well, the Professor might not have said, but you can bet Magneto would have.” He might be on their side now, but he was still a ruthless pragmatist. If it meant saving the future, she wasn’t sure there was a whole lot he _wouldn’t_ do. And in any case, in their time, Mystique was already dead.

“You’re probably right,” Logan muttered. “And lettin’ him...that’d be the easy way. I doubt anythin’ about this is supposed to be easy.”

She gave him a crooked smile, and rested her hand on the table beside his, almost but not quite touching. “You too, huh? We just can’t catch a break.”

Logan rested her hand over hers. She could feel the heat of it even through her glove. “I’m sure the Professor would have somethin’ profound and meaningful to say about that,” he said. “Me, I just think we have the worst fuckin’ luck in the world.”

Marie leaned a little closer to him. With her currently elevated senses, he smelled lik...home. “Well, it could be worse,” she said meditatively.

“Oh yeah? How?”

She looked up, and gave him as innocent an expression as she was capable of. “There could be snakes.”

He stared at her a moment, almost gaping, and burst into a laugh so deep she could feel the vibration of it in his chest. She’d heard him laugh like that only a few times in all the years she’d known him, and she couldn’t hide the smile that gave her.

“What’s so funny?” Clarice called.

Logan was still laughing too hard to answer, his shoulders actually shaking. “I said at least there’s no snakes on the plane,” Marie said.

Kitty snorted, choking on her own laughter, and Clarice rolled her eyes. Naturally, the Professor and Magneto looked totally bewildered. “Don’t ask,” Kitty said. “You’ll find out in like thirty years.”

Both men continued to eye her with distrust. “At the risk of sounding totally childish,” the Professor said, sounding a bit strained, “are we nearly there yet?”

\--

Kitty normally didn’t mind flying, because normally she did so in one of the X-Jets. Actual _planes_ , she had discovered, were another thing entirely -- she wasn’t just entertaining the Professor and aggravating Magneto for their sakes. The longer the flight had gone on, the more desperate she’d been to distract herself.

Logan had probably picked up on it -- he could smell anxiety, after all -- but thankfully he hadn’t said anything. When they finally started descending, it was all she could do not to crawl under one of the tables and cling to a leg like a spider monkey. Nobody else seemed remotely concerned, which just made it worse.

So. Paris. Rogue spoke French, and the Professor probably did, too -- which was fortunate, because Kitty didn’t speak a word, and she was pretty sure Clarice didn’t, either. She wouldn’t trust Magneto to translate anything properly, and at this age, she doubted Hank was much of a linguistics guy. His older self was a bit of a Renaissance dude, but this young Hank seemed to be made up of two parts genius and eight parts awkward.

When the plane finally touched down, she couldn’t help an audible sigh of relief. She definitely wasn’t looking forward to going home the same way, but she’d worry about that later.

“You can quit gripping the seat now,” Logan said, arching an eyebrow at her. She scowled at him, but didn’t dignify _that_ one with a response.

She side-eyed Magneto as he stood, gauging his balance. He wasn’t leaning like a drunk anymore, but he definitely wasn’t 100%, either: if he tried anything stupid, it wouldn’t be hard for Logan or Rogue to stop him. Now that they could actually move around, it would be harder for he and the Professor to get in another fight (she hoped), so she left them to it, making her way up to Logan and Rogue.

“So how are we supposed to get into this peace conference?” she asked. “The security might not be as tight as it would be in the future, but they probably don’t let just anyone wander around.” She could get them _inside_ very easily, but none of them could go invisible. Even if the Professor had a stash of business suits somewhere on the plane, they weren’t likely to fit anyone but him. Her own stolen suit wouldn’t have passed muster even if she still had the shoes.

Logan shrugged. She wasn’t surprised that he didn’t seem very concerned about that. “In my experience, it doesn’t matter what you’re wearin’, as long’s you act like you belong there.”

Fair enough. It was how she’d managed to wander around the Pentagon for an entire day. Still, looking at the entire lot of them...Clarice sure as hell wouldn’t make it more than two steps, given what she looked like. Rogue’s hair was fairly distinctive, and Logan was...Logan. Enough said. Even though Hank had taken off that ridiculous excuse for a hat, she doubted his nerves would be able to stand the strain. The Professor could look and act the part, and Magneto probably would, too, but the last thing she wanted was to let _him_ around so many important delegates. It might be smart to incapacitate him before they even started, though she wasn’t so sure the Professor would go for that.

“I guess,” she said, dubious. “You think the Professor has any shoes I can borrow?”

Logan snorted. “With your Cinderella feet? Doubt it.”

Rogue kicked him under the table. “Rude,” she said, but there was no real annoyance behind it. 

He arched an eyebrow, but said nothing. Smart man.

Kitty sighed. Barefoot, homeless-office-worker-chic, here she came. At least her clothes had mostly dried out by now.

They actually managed to disembark without anyone tripping and breaking their neck, which was a mercy. She drew a deep breath, relishing the feel of the tarmac under her feet (even if she did step on far too many pebbles). It was overcast at the moment, but warm, and she paused to savor it while the rest went ahead. For the first time since she’d landed in 1973, she actually felt calm.

Until, that is, she got hit by a baggage truck.

\--

Marie screamed, and she wasn’t the only one. Kitty hadn’t had any warning before the idiot driver plowed into her, and so hadn’t been able to phase herself out until it was too late. She bounced off the hood like a child’s toy, flailing, and landed on the tarmac with a cringeworthy _thud_.

“Oh, fuck _everything_ ,” she grumbled, to Marie’s intense relief -- if Kitty could swear, she probably wasn’t going to die.

Marie knelt beside her, brushing the hair out of her face. Though Kitty had a large scrape on her cheek and a rather bloody laceration on her forehead, she was scowling like thunder, evidently too angry to let anything hurt. “I was right,” she muttered. “Three for three. Help me up, will you?”

“Just wait a minute,” Hank said. “Let me make sure you haven’t broken anything.” He knelt beside Marie, carefully feeling Kitty’s neck and shoulders. Had he already started studying medicine? Marie wondered. If so, thank God.

She looked up to find both Logan and the Professor yelling at the driver in French -- Christ, even the Professor was throwing out words that would make a sailor blush. Clarice hovered halfway between the van and Kitty, evidently torn between helping and hurling abuse, and Magneto -- oh, hell, had they gone and lost him already?

“Shit,” she muttered. “Hank, stay here. I’m gonna go see if I can find our frienemy.”

Kitty laughed, and immediately winced. Shit. If they had to take her to the hospital, that was going to complicate things. “Go ahead. Just don’t choke him again.”

Marie sighed. She was probably never going to live that one down. The tarmac was so huge that he couldn’t have gone far even if he’d taken off running, but there were a few things he could hide behind

As much fun as it could be to use his own mutation against him, she couldn’t be sure there was no one else watching: if she started shifting the parked baggage trucks and shuttle-buses around willy-nilly, there was a chance someone would spot it. In this instance, Logan’s mutation would be a lot more useful.

Magneto smelled, unsurprisingly, like metal, but also a little like smoke -- which was just a bit weird, since as far as she knew, he hadn’t been around any fires recently. It was distinctive enough that she could track him even across such a long, empty stretch of asphalt: he was headed for the terminal, no doubt looking to mug someone for their money so he could get a cab to the conference. If he really was planning to kill Mystique, he’d also need a gun, and she wasn’t exactly sure just what the firearms laws were like in France. Hopefully it was more like England than America, so it would be more difficult for him to get his hands on one.

When she reached the cargo bay door, she almost ran right into him. To her satisfaction, he actually recoiled a little -- not much, not so that most would notice, but her borrowed feral senses caught both it and a faint scent of fear. It was all she could do not to grin.

“Following me, were you?” he asked, quirking an eyebrow at her.

Marie, momentarily channeling her adolescence, rolled her eyes. “ _Duh,_ ” she said. “You think I’m gonna let you wander off and get someody killed? Your name oughtta be Havoc, not Magneto.”

“I knew someone called Havok, once,” he said, and to her surprise, he actually sounded...sad? Huh. “I have no intention of leaving you all yet.” He didn’t need to add, _You’re all too useful to me._

“...Uh-huh.” She noticed, for the first time, that he was carrying a large, brown paper bag. It smelled quite a bit like garlic. “What’s in the bag?”

“Something,” he said, and gave her a look of such maddening superiority that she wanted to knock it off his face with her fist. 

_Calm_ , she told herself, drawing a steadying breath. “Well, c’mon. We oughtta get back before somebody kills that driver.”

She didn’t at all like having him walking behind her -- it was like having a snake at her back, and it made her shoulder blades itch. She had no doubt he knew it, too, but she didn’t have time to teach him manners.

When they reached the van, the Professor had given up harrassing the driver, but Logan was still going strong. He was probably the one who had given the poor bastard a rather spectacular black eye.

Kitty was sitting up, still scowling, while the Professor pressed a handkerchief over the wound on her forehead. Hank was still nervously checking her for broken bones, and Clarice seemed to be quite entertained watching Logan figuratively rip the driver a new one. So, as far as this group went, things were fairly normal.

“Where did he come from?” Clarice asked, just as the Professor said, “Where did you go?”

Kitty burst out laughing. “Where did you come from, Cotton-Eyed Joe?” she sang, a little off-key. God, did she have a concussion? That wasn’t something Hank could treat with a Band-Aid. 

Magneto, obviously exasperated, shook his head. He opened the bag, and pulled out a freshly-baked baguette, which he tossed at Kitty. She fumbled catching it, almost dropping it in her lap. “Eat your damn bread.”

\--

Though Logan would never admit it to anyone, he was actually having fun.

Kitty seemed to be more or less okay -- if a little concussed -- and Logan had been itching for a fight since he first got here. He probably couldn’t get away with breaking any of Magneto’s bones, but this idiot was a decent substitute.

His French was a little rusty, but he still knew how to threaten and swear, which was pretty much all he needed. The driver was a spotty-faced boy who couldn’t have been any more than nineteen, with bleached hair and a nose ring Logan had been very tempted to rip out. Castigating his driving had turned to insulting him, his mother, and his dog (and eventually a combination of the three). It wasn’t until Marie intervened that Logan so much as paused for breath.

“Sugar, that’s not just disgustin’ -- I’m pretty sure it’s anatomically impossible. I think you made your point. Hank doesn’t think Kitty’s broken anythin’, but we need to get her cleaned up and put a real bandage on her head. Help us get her back on the plane, would you?”

If it was anyone but Marie asking.... He gave the kid one last glare, and went to deal with Kitty. She had blood all over her rumpled dress shirt, though the Professor had managed to wipe her face off some. Her eyes were slightly glazed, and she was gnawing on the end of a goddamn baguette. 

What.

“Where the hell did she get that thing?” he asked, crouching beside her. Yeah, she was definitely glassy-eyed, and a little too pale, but she’d live.

“Magneto threw it at her,” Clarice said, her tone suggesting she knew exactly how fucking bizarre that sounded.

“Why -- wait, I don’t even wanna ask. C’mon, kid. Professor, I hope you’ve got a spare shirt in that thing.” She gripped the baguette when he picked her up, still chewing, and he shook his head. And people said _he_ ate like an animal.

“I do,” the Professor said, following hot on his heels. “And a proper first-aid kit. Mind her head.”

“I already mind it,” Kitty muttered. “Hurts.”

“I’m sure it does,” Logan said dryly. “You must have a thick skull.”

“Logan, don’t start,” Marie warned. “At least wait until she can snark back.”

“Oh, joy,” Magneto said, utterly deadpan.

“Don’t go thinkin’ you’re going anywhere, Bub,” Logan growled. 

Magneto gave him a rather disturbing smile. “I wouldn’t dream of it.” 

Logan paused long enough to give him a suspicious glance. There wasn’t any scent of lie about the man, but that was not reassuring. It just meant that whatever he was plotting was probably going to get them all in a lot of trouble. 

Great.

\--

Hank got Kitty’s forehead bandaged, and Rogue and Clarice helped her into a clean shirt. Hank had given her a shot of some painkiller that was probably just a little too strong -- when she wasn’t mauling the baguette into submission, she was singing Cher songs.

The Professor just sat and put his head in his hands, and Clarice didn’t wonder why. If she’d had to pick a group to change the future and save the world, this would not be it.

“We’ve gotta go,” Logan said. “All of us that can. Mystique won’t wait forever.”

“We sorta need her to get inside, though, don’t we?” Rogue asked. “If Mystique’s in there, you can track her by smell no matter what she looks like, but I really don’t think we can just barge on in.”

“She’s hardly in any condition to be useful,” Magneto said. He was possibly a little too amused by Kitty’s current predicament, if his expression was anything to go by.

Kitty gave him the finger. “I can get you in,” she said, and she sounded at least marginally lucid. “What happens after that’s your problem, not mine.”

“Can you even _walk_?” he demanded.

She stood, giving him a defiant glare, and took a few careful steps. Her balance was wobbly, but she managed a more or less straight line. “Happy?”

“Ecstatic. Let’s go. We need a car -- preferrably something larger than the last...thing.”

Clarice had to agree. She hovered just behind Kitty as she walked, ready to catch her should the need arise, but Kitty seemed to be managing pretty well out of sheer spite. Getting her back down the steps was a bit tricky, but the managed it.

The clouds had thickened, and were turning an alarming shade of black. A scent of ozone filled the air, hot and sharp: a storm was coming, and they needed to get undercover before the sky opened up and soaked them all again.

Rogue paused, glancing toward the end of the tarmac. “I think we’ve got our transportation,” she said, pointing to the shuttle-buses. “Logan, you can hotwire one, right?”

“Darlin’, the day I find somethin’ I _can’t_ hotwire is the day I’m six feet under. Let’s get this dog-and-pony show on the road.” Evidently he didn’t trust Kitty’s balance _that_ much, because he picked her up like a sack of potatoes.

The Professor sighed, but Hank laughed before he could help it. Kitty, for her part, just looked confused and a little disgruntled.

Sirens started blaring while they were still a hundred yards from the buses, and Clarice winced. She’d known it would be only a matter of time before that terrified baggage-cart driver ratted them out, but she’d hoped he’d wait until they were well away.

They took off, all of them, running like a group of children evading a recess-teacher. Clarice wasn’t the only one that flinched when thunder cracked overhead, so low that she’d swear it rattled her teeth. Lightning strobed through the clouds, brief but blinding, and Logan snarled when they reached the nearest shuttle.

“Here, hold this,” he said, tossing Kitty at Magneto before he hauled back and punched the glass door, wrenching it open with one hand. “Everybody, in.”

Kitty let out an indignant yelp, almost knocking Magneto off his feet when she collided with him. Rogue groaned, trying to help her friend stand upright, shooting Logan a glare that promised retribution later. Somehow, it managed to be even more poisonous than Magneto’s expression, which shouldn’t have been possible.

Miraculously, they all managed to scramble through the door in one piece, though the Professor accidentally whacked Hank in the face with his elbow. Clarice, wiser than she perhaps appeared, tripped her way to the back of the bus, letting the others fight over the closer seats.

Rain lashed down quite abruptly, pounding on the roof, hitting the windows so hard that for a moment she thought it was hail. The engine coughed and wheezed as Logan did....whatever it was that Logan did, which mostly seemd to consist of smashing wires together and swearing. 

Fortunately, the motor roared to life before the cops actually caught up with them. Logan flung himself into the driver’s seat and stomped on the gas without bothering to warn anybody, with the result that half of them went flying like bowling pins. 

The tires squealed as they tore off, speeding out toward the parking lot. Clarice clung to the back of the seat in front of her like a barnacle, fervently thankful that she didn’t get carsick as the bus gave a drunken lurch. She was pretty sure the thing was not meant to corner like Logan was forcing it to, and for a brief, horrible moment she was afraid he’d actually flip it. People screamed and swore as they barreled through, someone actually throwing half a sandwich that splatted on the windshield. The driving rain only halfway washed it off: runny streaks of mayonnaise turned the glass into some kind of distorted, gooey cataract.

That had to be responsible for what happened next. There was simply no other way Logan could have failed to see the figure that staggered in front of the bus -- as it was, they plowed right into somebody, who bounced much as Kitty had done, and smashed up against the window.

Incredibly, the person actually clung to the front of the car, fingers digging in around the edge of the hood near the windshield. It was a woman, young and blonde and completely infuriated, with venomous yellow eyes that even Clarice could recognize.

“ _Mystique?!_ ” Rogue cried. “Shit, Logan, stop! Stop!”

He did, slamming the brakes so hard that Mystique lost her grip and went slithering up the windshield, smearing mayonnaise as she went.

“I’m sensing a pattern here,” Kitty said, a little vaguely.

“Oh, motherfucker.” Logan leapt out of his seat, wrenched the door open again, and grabbed Mystique by one leg. She quite evidently did not want to be grabbed, and kicked him in the face several times, but she was dazed enough that he actually managed to manhandle her into the bus.

“Hi,” Kitty said, giving her a cheerful wave. “We were looking for you.”

Mystique clutched the steel railing, staring at them all. She barely reacted when Logan slapped the bus back into gear and zoomed off again, tires squealing once more. Her eyes, now blue, roved over all of them, before settling on the Professor.

“What the hell, Charles?”

He gave a pained sigh. “It’s a long story.”

“I just bet it is.”

“We need to make sure you don’t kill a dude,” Kitty piped up.

“And that nobody kills _you_ ,” Rogue added, with a very pointed look at Magneto. He actually had the grace to look uncomfortable.

“How about we just avoid killing in general?” Hank said. He was looking a little green: it seemed he didn’t share Clarice’s immunity to carsickness.

“If anybody’s gonna kill someone, it’s gonna be _me_ ,” Logan growled, running a red light as he blasted through an intersection.

“How about we just all eat bread?” Kitty offered. “Bread fixes everything, right?”

“Are we sure she doesn’t have a concussion?” Clarice asked, worried.

“No, we’re not,” Hank replied. “Can we go back to the plane now?”

“With all those police around?” Rogue said. “Hell no. We’ve gotta wait this out somewhere.”

“Yeah, but _where_?” Clarice demanded.

“Bread,” Kitty said, evidently stuck on the idea.

The Professor looked at them all, his expression thoughtful. “Not a bad idea,” he said. “Logan, stop driving like a lunatic. There’s a little restaurant near the Seine -- it’s not a tourist destination, so we might be able to get a table big enough for all of us.” He smiled, and it was one of the serene smiles the older Professor often had. It would seem his capacity for weirdness had finally over-filled, and he was probably just running with it at this point. Honestly, with this bunch, there wasn’t much else he _could_ do. “Let’s do lunch."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaand the craziness continues. Ororo will meet up with them next chapter, and we will also get our first glimpse of Trask. And yes, I stole one of Kitty’s lines from _Juno_. It seemed appropriate.


	5. Storms, Booze, and Bad Ideas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which lunch is had, things are awkward, Ororo makes terrible decisions while drunk, bread continues to be thrown, and Trask is unaware his life is shortly to go to hell.

The restaurant, a tiny little hole-in-the wall -- with a name that even Marie, with her halfway decent command of French, couldn’t pronounce -- was indeed mostly empty. The waiter eyed them with justifiable nervousness, but something the Professor showed him made his eyes go dark with greed.

They had to put several of the tables -- scarred oak, probably very old -- together, and Hank, Kitty, and Clarice needed to have the menus translated. Drinks and bread were ordered, but after they’de arrived, a very awkward silence fell.

Marie temporarily distracted herself by looking around the restaurant. Everything in it looked antique -- there was a lot of old, dark wood, the lighting recessed and muted, with some Impressionist paintings on the walls that she suspected weren’t reproductions. She fancied she could smell the money that had gone into it.

“Well,” Kitty said, munching on another piece of baguette, “ _this_ is awkward.”

Wonder of wonders, that actually made Mystique _smile_. It was a slight thing, brief and more than a little bitter, but it was there. “That’s one way of putting it. Why are you really here?”

“Trask,” Marie said, before Logan could open his mouth and stick his foot in it. “We came back to keep you from --” she glanced around, making sure the waiter wasn’t in earshot “-- killin’ him.”

“Back from _where_?” Mystique asked, clearly doubtful.

“The future,” Logan put in. “In our past -- your future -- when you killed Trask, you made him a martyr. People started believin’ we were as dangerous as he said. So they built a bunch of killer robots that hunted us all down, along with all the humans who tried to help us.”

“And there were a lot,” Marie added, with a very pointed look at Magneto. “When it came down to it, most of them fought and died alongside us.” True, it had taken something as horrible as the Sentinels to forge that alliance, but he didn’t need to know that.

“The Sentinels started out just hunting us,” Kitty said, sounding much more lucid, “but then they went after anyone with a dormant X-gene, who might have had mutant kids or grandkids. Which is a lot more humans than you’d think.”

“We can’t let that happen,” the Professor put in. There was such raw pain in his eyes that Marie couldn’t look at him for long. “Come home, Raven.”

Mystique gave Magneto a glare that was made of far more sadness than anger. “I’m not so sure I’d be welcome.”

Silence fell, and Kitty glanced from Magneto to Mystique, and back again. Marie felt her kick his leg under the table, giving him a look that very obviously said, _Say something, you idiot!_ Trust Kitty to be that perceptive, even with a concussion.

“You could come with us, if you want,” she offered, when he very stubbornly said nothing. “Most of us haven’t even been born yet. We need to find someplace to set up new lives, too.”

Magneto shot her an extremely withering glare, and she returned it in full force. Marie thought she could imagine what her friend was saying quite well: _If you’re going to be a dumbass, she’s coming with us._ It would be much easier for Kitty, who had never met older Mystique, to feel sorry for her than it would for Marie or Logan.

“And do what?” Mystique asked, a little scornfully. “Get some dead-end job? Rent some crappy apartment?”

“Come to the school,” the Professor said. “It will always be your home, Raven, whenever you want to return to it. You will never be unwelcome.” His glare at Magneto easily rivaled Kitty’s.

“He means it, you know,” Hank said, a trifle nervously. He certainly smelled anxious, but there was also -- oh, _this_ was interesting. And possibly a terrible complication.

Marie glanced at Logan, knowing he’d smell what she did. He just arched an eyebrow. Well, great. Relationship drama never ended well. _God, how weird is this?_ she thought. Given that she knew all these people when they were much older, seeing them like this, her own age and embroiled in relationship crap -- well, it was jarring. She smelled a love triangle, and it stank. She’d always hated those in movies, and she _really_ hated the thought of having to deal with one in real life. Somebody had to do something, before the tension got any worse.

_Forgive me, Professor_ , she thought. There wasn’t a whole lot of metal in this place, but the paintings were hung on nails, and she carefully eased one out of the wall. She picked the one supporting the ugliest painting, so even if the fall did destroy it, it wouldn’t look like any great loss.

Even thought she’d been expecting the crash, she still jumped. The glass shattered with a sound like an exloding bomb. Clarice flinched so violently that she knocked over her wine glass, and Kitty, evidently still stuck deep in her pastry obsession, grabbed the breadbasket and cradled it as though protecting a child. Hank twitched, and even the Professor looked startled. That’s right -- out of all of them, only Logan, Kitty, and Clarice actually knew the full scope of her mutation. The rest wouldn’t have any idea that she’d abosrbed Magneto’s power along with a good chunk of his life-force. Maybe she ought to give them something to think about.

“Whoops,” she said blandly. “My bad.”

Both the Professor and Magneto gave her very hard stares. Once upon a time, she might have wilted under it, but after spending so long in the camps, being subjected to almost every indignity a person could suffer, she just stared right back.

The poor waiter, far more clueless than any of them, bustled over like a panicked hen, apologizing profusely even as he swept up the broken glass. Marie winced a little -- she had to feel sorry for him, since it was possible he’d get in trouble for that. She hoped it wouldn’t cost him his job, but honestly, she hadn’t known what else to do.

“How did you do that?” Magneto asked, his voice as hard as his expression, and very sharp.

“I’m special,” she replied, just as blandly. “Can we get back on track here?” She looked at Mystique, and her expression softened a little. “Raven, we’re gonna need your help,” she said. “Trask livin’ isn’t enough. We need to get the whole program scrapped, and you’re the only one who get into where we need to get into, to actually do that.” That sentence was just a bit garbled, but surely she’d get the point. She had to hear that she was needed, that she wouldn’t just be some surplus person in their mission.

Mystique blinked, possibly surprised to hear her real name coming from a stranger’s lips. “You’re from the future?” she asked, still sounding uncertain. “What happens to me there?”

Marie winced. There was no point in lying. “You died. The Sentinels are so dangerous because they were programmed with your mutation -- they can adapt to target anyone.” She shuddered and looked away, unable to meet anyone’s eyes. “They’ve got mine, too. That’s what they did, while I was in the camps -- they took my DNA, and experimented on the other prisoners until they got it right.”

She felt Logan’s eyes on her, but she couldn’t look at him. Marie knew he wouldn’t insult her by pitying her, but she hadn’t wanted him to know. She hadn’t wanted anyone to know.

A truly terrible silence fell. Logan took her hand under the table, giving it a reassuring squeeze -- he wouldn’t do anything more, not in public, because he knew her well enough to know she might break down entirely if he did. She desperately hoped nobody would ask her any further questions, because in her current state, she’d probably answer them. 

“What were these...camps?” Magneto asked, and only her keen hearing could have caught the hesitation in his voice.

She looked at him, knowing this would hit him where he lived. “Concentration camps,” she said flatly. “For us and the humans who helped us. The humans were slave labor, and the mutants were lab rats. _Are_ lab rats, and they’ll stay like that unless we change the future.”

Oooh, yep, there it was -- even those with normal sense had to have caught that flinch. He said nothing, however, because really, what was there _to_ say?

“We can change that,” Kitty said, finally putting the bread down. “ _All_ of us,” she added, with a pointed look at Mystique. “Seriously, we really can’t do this without you. I can get into places, but you’re the only one who can actually blend in and stay there.”

Mystique was quite for so long that their food had arrived by the time she spoke. “I need some air,” she said, standing and shoving her seat back.

“I’ll go with you.” Kitty was still a little unsteady as she rose, and her face went a bit green.

Mystique shot her a rather nasty look. “Why?”

“To make sure you don’t run off,” Kitty said, an implied _duh_ at the end of the sentence. She was blunt enough anyway that Marie doubted it was the concussion talking.

“Do you really think you could stop me?” Mystique asked, arching an eyebrow.

“Nope,” Kitty said, almost cheerfully. “But it’s the thought that counts.”

That actually drew another smile. “At least you’re honest,” Mystique said. “That’s not something I find very often, anymore.”

“Then let’s go. Logan, don’t you dare eat all our food while we’re gone.”

\--

It was still bucketing rain when Kitty and Mystique went outside, which left them stuck standing under the awning. At least they were at an angle where nobody inside could see them. Kitty waited patiently for Mystique to speak, knowing the woman needed time to think.

“Am I really dead in the future?” she asked at last, her voice small.

“Yeah,” Kitty said. “You and so many more of us. The Professor -- Charles -- he said it all started with Trask, and he’s smart enough that I believe him.”

Again, Mystique was quiet for some time. “It’s not that simple,” she said. “Going home, I mean.”

“You mean, because of Magneto?” Kitty asked, a little flatly. “Ignore him. He’s a stubborn dumbass.”

Mystique looked at her curiously. “You’re the one that kicked him, aren’t you?”

Kitty gave her a slightly lopsided smile. “Yep. Don’t let him being an idiot keep you from coming home. Home is...important.” Home, she knew, could be as much about people as it was about a physical place. The last few years had taught her that. 

Mystique scowled at the rain. “I loved him,” she said, and there was no bitterness in it: it was a statement of fact, and nothing more.

“Past tense?” Kitty said.

“ _Very_ past,” Mystique muttered. “And that’s the problem. In case you haven’t noticed, he’s kind of a narcissist. He might not want me anymore, but I don’t think he’ll be able to stand knowing I don’t want him, either.”

Kitty snorted. She couldn’t help herself. “ _Kind of_ a narcissist? He has an ego the size of Mount Everest. And he threw bread at me. Don’t ask,” she added. After a pause, she said, “If it makes you feel any better, Rogue choked him out on the flight over, and I had all kinds of fun pissing him off while he recovered.”

Mystique stared at her a moment, and burst into a peal of genuinely warm laughter. Kitty had to wonder when she’d last done that. It had probably been a long time, given how hoarse the sound was.

“Seriously,” Kitty said. “Come with us. We’re fun, when we’re not all insane. And you know way more about this time period than the rest of us. I don’t know that I trust Logan to not just get us all in trouble.”

Again, she received a faint smile. “I’ll think about it. I came here to do a job, but if I shouldn’t...I don’t know what to do.”

Kitty leaned a little toward her. “Between you and me, none of us know what to do. We don’t know how we got here, or how to go home...if it makes you feel any better, we’re as much in the dark as you. Maybe even more.”

Whatever Mystique wanted to say to that, she didn’t get a chance. The awning creaked and groaned as something large and rather heavy crashed onto it, the old, worn fabric giving way entirely with a tremendous rip. Mystique, possessing far superior reflexes, dodged out into the rain, but Kitty, who was already at a disadvantage thanks to her adventure with the baggage truck, got knocked flat onto the bricks.

The breath went out of her in one startled, horrible _whoosh_ , her head ringing as it hit the ground. She couldn’t even summon enough will to swear, though she very much wanted to.

The thing that landed on her turned out to be a person -- a very familiar woman, dark-skinned and white-haired, who looked distinctly harrassed. There were a number of pigeon feathers in her hair, and several scratches on her face. “Kitty?” she said, incredulous.

“Hi, Ororo,” Kitty managed, somehow getting actual words through her fit of coughing. “You look like shit.”

Ororo snorted -- understandably, since Kitty was hardly one to talk. “I ran into a flock of birds. Literally. How did you get here?”

Kitty shrugged, staggering as Ororo tried to help her to her feet. “Dunno. Raven, this is Ororo. Ororo, this Raven. We’re trying to talk her into going with us.”

“We?” Ororo asked. It was fairly obvious that she didn’t recognize Mystique’s actual name -- which was probably fortunate. Ororo had had far too many nasty dealings with her in the future.

“Me and Rogue and Clarice. Professor’s in there, too, and oh God, you should see Hank. He doesn’t look anything like...well, him.”

“Did you get Magneto?” Ororo asked, brushing off her uniform and trying to pick the feathers out of her hair.

“Yeah. Rogue tried to strangle him, and he threw bread at me after I got hit by a truck. Which, yeah, by the way, watch out for traffic. So far all three of us have been run over by someone.”

“You got hit by a _truck?_ ” Mystique said, before Ororo could.

“It’s how I got this.” Kitty tried to gesture at the bandage on her forehead, but wound up poking it instead. “Ow.”

Ororo glanced from one woman to the other, and sighed. “I’m probably going to regret asking what’s happened to you all in the last few days.”

“Yeah, probably,” Kitty agreed easily. “Come on, let’s eat. Raven, let me know if a certain someone needs a good kicking. Logan told me once that my feet are extra pointy because they’re so small.”

She was gratified to earn another smile from Mystique. While she didn’t yet dare hope things were going to work out, at least they didn’t look completely dreadful at the moment.

\--

Erik hadn’t thought it would have been possible for his mood to get any worse, but it had. Oh, it had.

Seeing Raven always filled him with a formless guilt. What she’d done, what she’d become, was his fault, yet he couldn’t bring himself to apologize. Not even after a surprisingly hard kick to the shin. If only he’d let her be, none of this might have happened. She would have stayed Charles’s sister, and while she might not have embraced her mutant powers, she would almost certainly have been happier than she was now. 

That being said, he was surprised -- and a little worried -- to see her smiling when she came back in, accompanied by the tiny concussed Kitty and another woman, who looked faintly exasperated. She was taller than Raven, and even with the feathers (what?) in her hair, she carried a quiet strength.

“Ororo?!” Marie cried, halfway rising from her seat.

“I think we maybe _are_ all back here,” Kitty said, bracing herself against the table before she sat down. “Ooo. Food.”

Raven snickered -- actually snickered. “Did you expect it to go somewhere?”

Kitty pointed her fork at Logan, which was all the answer needed. 

He rolled his eyes, and went to grab another chair. Erik watched them all with quietly increasing alarm. He couldn’t kill Raven now, even if he’d wanted to, and killing Trask was evidently off the menu as well, so now what? His instinct was to find the lab responsible for building the Sentinels and wipe it off the map. It wouldn’t be difficult.

Except...all those from the future regarded him with hostility at best, and outright loathing at worst. If his future self had followed his instincts, they had clearly failed him. The mutant race needed a leader who could be ruthless if necessary -- Charles, while brilliant, was fettered by his morals. However, it would seem they also needed a leader more subtle than Erik liked. In his mind, they should rise up and take their rightful place as humanity’s overlords, but if what he had seen in the last day was any indication, he was in the minority. These people, each so powerful, would never help him.

And oh, did he resent it. He seethed in silence, ignoring the flutter around the new woman, until a crouton bounced off his nose. 

“Keep frowning and your face will freeze like that,” Kitty said. “Look, I know you don’t like us, and I’m pretty sure the Professor is the only one who likes you, but if you want to do your thing and actually _succeed_ , you need to get over it and work with us.”

Her words hit unnervingly close to home -- but then, they would. Whatever he’d done in the future, she’d lived through it. She and all her companions would know more about whta he was willing to do than he did. 

“And it’s that easy?” he said, not bothering to keep the sarcasm from his voice.

She glanced around the table. “With this group? No. But what other choice have you got? Keep going after the humans, and make them _and_ us hate you? ‘Cause that’s worked out so great for you in the future. Only thing you accomplished is getting a lot of people killed. Think before you act, okay?” She flicked another crouton at him, but this time he caught it.

“Sage words, for a child,” he said, utterly caustic.

Kitty rolled her eyes. “Thiiiirty-threeee,” she said, drawing it out. “I know I look like I’m ten, but seriously, you’re what, like six years older than me? Give us all a little credit. I’d bet you anything we’ve seen more than you have. Even the ones that weren’t in the camps. Which, yeah, don’t ask Rogue about that. Just...don’t. If she doesn’t kill you, Logan will.”

Erik had absolutely no desire to do so. He didn’t like thinking of his own time in his own camps, and he certainly didn’t want to hear about anyone else’s. “Fine,” he said. “I’ll wait, and I’ll think.”

She gave him a grin that he thought was a little smug. When she turned away to look at Ororo, he gave into an utterly childish impulse, and lobbed the crouton back at her. It stuck in her hair without her noticing, and he allowed himself a slightly vindictive, equally childhish smile. He would cooperate with them, but that didn’t mean he’d make their lives easy.

\--

Ororo was still cold and wet, but at least she had some hot food inside her, as well as a little too much French wine. It was the latter that gave her what she was certain was a brilliant idea.

“He’s so obsessed with proving how dangerous _we_ are,” she said, polishing off a sweet, buttery pastry. “Maybe we need to remind him that he really ought to be worrying about his own people. Stastically, they’re a lot greater threat.”

“What are you saying?” the Professor -- and oh, how strange it was, thinking of this young man as Charles Xavier -- said. “You want to hire some humans and kidnap him?”

She gave him a sly, slightly drunken smile. “No. I say we pretend to be human, and kidnap him ourselves. He’s a delegate at a peace conference, isn’t he? They’re prime hostage targets.”

“They are?” he asked. “Since when?”

“Since the 1980’s,” Logan said. “Ororo, look, I know this sounds like a great idea, but you’re seriously fuckin’ drunk right now.” He looked around the table. “You _all_ are.”

“That doesn’t mean it’s a bad idea,” the Professor said, thoughtful. “Some of us would have to sit out --” he glanced at Clarice, who simply shrugged “-- but the rest of us could pretend to be human. We can’t use my plane, though. I don’t want this being traced to me.”

“We wouldn’t need to take it that far,” Ororo said. “Even if it’s a botched joke of a kidnapping, it will make him think. We steal a van, grab him, drive around bickering for a while, and let him escape. As long as none of us use our powers, he won’t have any reason to think we’re anything but human.” She looked at Logan. “You use those claws so instinctively that you should probably sit this one out, too. Stay with Clarice, in case you need each other.”

“He won’t have arrived yet,” the woman, Raven, said. Ororo would swear she was familiar, but couldn’t place her. “We need somewhere to stay for the night.”

“Well, we probably can’t go back to the plane yet. We’ll need a hotel for the night,” the Professor said. 

That wasn’t a bad idea. After such a long, miserable flight, she could use a hot shower.

“Good luck getting one,” Raven said. “I barely managed to book a room. Most of the hotels are overrun by the delegates.”

That earned a collective groan, but the Professor just looked at her thoughtfully. Whatever she read in his expression made her eyes widen.

“No, Charles,” she said, quite emphatically. “No. Absolutely not.”

\--

Raven’s room would have been quite spacious for one or two people. While the hotel wasn’t fancy, it was still fairly upscale: the floors were covered in pale cream carpet, and the art on the walls was actually decent. Unfortunately, all eight of them were jammed into it, a fact which pleased absolutely no one.

They’d had a brief shopping excursion before going to the hotel, grabbing toiletries and spare clothes. Marie had always thought shopping in Paris would be exciting, but they had to practically run to get everything before the stores closed. The Professor only had American money on him, and haggling over the exchange rate took a surprisingly long time. 

They let Ororo have the shower first, because she certainly needed it most. Marie sat in the corner, right below the window, trying to stay out of the way and not get stepped on.

How on Earth were they going to manage this? She didn’t dare sleep within reach of other people, because she couldn’t sleep with her gloves on. The last thing they needed was for her to accidentally slap someone and kill them in the middle of the night. Logan had a history of terrible nightmares -- as she’d found out the almost-lethal way -- and Kitty had a tendency to phase through whatever she was sleeping on, which in this case would drop her down into the room below. Marie couldn’t count the times she’d woken at school to find Kitty under her bed, rather than on it.

It didn’t look like anybody else was any happier with the situation than she was, either. They were all trying to stake out spots as far from the others as they could get, but in such a small room, that wasn’t really possible. Watching Logan and Magneto glare at one another from opposite walls was pretty funny, but not enough to kill her own anxieties.

“Fuck it,” she muttered. “I’m sleeping in the tub.”

\--

On a plane still making its descent to Paris Charles de Gaulle, a man named Bolivar Trask sat in blissful ignorance of the turn his life was going to take the next morning. For now, all was right in his world: his meetings were set, his files in place. If the United States government wouldn’t fund the Sentinels, he’d find others who would.

Had he known what awaited in approximately eleven hours, he would have regretted so much as thinking of the Sentinel program. And possibly tried to swim back across the Atlantic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, Trask. Now that you’ve arrived, you’re going to take over as this story’s chew toy (I’m sure Magneto will be glad for the break.) Can this group pretend to be ordinary human kidnappers, without fucking everything up? Of course not. But at least it’s not their fault.


	6. Epic Fail

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Trask is kidnapped, Logan is sweet in his own way, Kitty and Magneto engage in guerrilla crouton warfare, and French people still can’t drive.

Kitty, knowing her propensity to phase through whatever she slept on, was wise enough to make her bed on top of the armoir, shifting the TV onto the floor. Sure, she woke up in the middle of it, but at least she hadn’t gone to the room below.

However, armoirs were not known for being comfortable -- as a result, she woke with a crick in her neck, a pounding headache, and an unpleasantly damp bandage on her forehead. Oh, and a fucking crouton in her hair.

She held it in front of her (slightly blurry) eyes, scowling. As she had a tendency to wake long before everyone else, the only person who had beaten her to it was Logan -- she wondered if he’d even bothered going to sleep. She only discovered him because he’d parked himself on the bathroom floor, keeping a wary eye on Rogue, who for some damn reason had decided to sleep in the bathtub.

“Out,” Kitty ordered in a whisper. “I promise I won’t let anything eat her when I pee.”

Logan shot her an extremely unimpressed look, but at least he went. Once she’d done her business and brushed her teeth, she very carefully dampened the crouton in the sink. There was retribution to be had, before she bothered trying to eat breakfast.

With her unsteady balance, tiptoeing around the sleepers wasn’t easy, but she managed it. Unsurprisingly, Magneto had chose the corner furthest from everyone, so at least she didn’t have to do any creative maneuvering to lean down and very carefully stick the crouton in his ear.

Mission accomplished, she rifled through the shopping bags as quietly as she could, searching for the big bottle of aspirin they’d picked up last night. There was a rather large assortment of donuts, too, so she helped herself, munching on it while liberating some of the clothes they’d bought. Her stolen suit was absolutely ruined, but she’d found a reasonably-priced pair of jeans and an unfortunately loud patterned shirt. The platform shoes were a bit scary, but at least they fit. All things considered, it would probably be best if she wasn’t around when Magneto woke up and discovered her little present -- no matter how much she’d love to see his reaction. Logan would probably describe it to her later, in exquisit detail.

Meanwhile, she could make herself useful. She couldn’t rent a car by herself -- again, lack of French skills _and_ lack of money -- but that didn’t mean she couldn’t hunt. And it was a gorgeous morning: Ororo’s storm had dissipated once she’d landed, so the morning was bright and clear, the sun warm on her face.

Early though it was, the sidewalks were alreadly crowded. The platform shoes, so difficult to walk in, actually provided her an advantage, since for once she was close to average height. It meant she could keep a watchful eye on the road, which was just as jammed.

Paris was a very old city, and hadn’t been designed with modern traffic in mind. Even at this hour, the cars weren’t doing much more than creep, and unless she was much mistaken, most of them were filled with people connected to the peace conference. There was no other explanation for the number of dark sedans with tinted windows. She doubted any contained the delegates themselves -- from what Mystique said, they probably had all the really good hotel rooms. Such a large conference would need a lot of staff who came lower on the pecking order when it came to securing a place to stay.

Kitty stayed well back from the sidewalk’s edge, even though it meant her view was often obstructed by the passing crowds. Yesterday’s misadventure with the baggage truck had made her (understandably) leery of automobiles.

Would Trask be in one? Probably not. A bigwig like him would have secured a prime room very far in advance. Even so, she had a bit of time to kill before the others were likely to wake up, so she’d do a little poking.

\--

For having slept in a bathtub, Marie woke feeling surprisingly comfortable. 

She wasn’t terribly surprised to see Logan sitting on the floor beside the tub, back against the wall, intently cutting up a chunk of salami. “Did you even sleep?” she asked, rubbing her eyes.

He shrugged. “Didn’t need to. Here,” he added, handing her some salami. “Breakfast of champions.”

Marie eyed it. “I think I’ll brush my teeth first,” she said, as diplomatically as she could. 

“Coffee’s on out there,” Logan said. “Just don’t step on anyone to get to it.”

 _Coffee_. Marie hadn’t had coffee in years, and while she’d never been an avid drinker of the stuff, the thought of it now seemed absolutely decadent. She brushed her teeth in a hurry and crept out into the room.

The sight that met her was almost comical. You could tell a lot about a person by the way they slept, and she took the scene in as she tiptoed her way to the coffee pot. Hank might not look like Beast yet, but like many animals, he slept curled up in a ball. The Professor was a sprawler who had come incredibly close to thwacking Hank in the head; Clarice was on her back with her feet propped up on the end-table; Magneto was on his side with his back against the wall, and Ororo, who Raven had allowed to share the bed, had one arm dangling off the edge. Raven was straight and stiff as a board, and Marie wondered how she could actually sleep like that.

Kitty was nowhere to be seen, though a pillow and blanket on top of the armoir were testament to where she’d spent the night. Marie hoped she hadn’t phased through it and down into the room below, or they’d have a lot of explaining to do.

She poured herself some coffee, inhaling the aroma like it was the sweetest perfume in the world. Though her borrowed senses were fading, she still had enough of Logan’s sense of smell to truly appreciate the scent of coffee. Foregoing cream and sugar, she started creeping back to the bathroom as silently as she could.

“God dammit.”

The words made her jump, though she managed to avoid sloshing any coffee out of the mug. The voice belonged to Magneto, who was sitting up and scowling like thunder. He was holding something between his fingers, and glaring at it as though wishing he could set it on fire through sheer force of will.

Marie blinked. “Is that...a crouton?”

“ _Yes_ ,” he practically growled, though he looked a lot less threatening with his hair sticking up in five different directions. “Where is she?”

“Who?”

“The tiny obnoxious one. Kitty.”

It was all Marie could do not to laugh. “I think she went out,” she said. This would certainly explain her friend’s absence. Marie would have to tell her about it later. “If it makes you feel any better, there’s coffee.” She held her mug aloft, as though displaying a trophy.

Magneto’s expression suggested that _nothing_ was going to make him feel any better, but he stalked to the coffee pot anyway, taking little care not to disturb anyone else.

She disappeared into the bathroom before she could burst out laughing, but once she was inside, she dissolved into helpless snickering.

“What?” Logan asked, as she sat beside him. She told him, and he didn’t bother trying to mute his own laughter. “Better croutons than bullets,” he said. “Maybe we could get her to do that to Trask. Convince him it’s some kinda French torture technique.”

That made her crack up entirely again, until someone pounded on the door. It turned out to be Hank, who was shuffling rather like a zombie. He shooed them out with a vague wave of one hand. Magneto was sitting on top of the armoir, glaring at his coffee mug as though it had personally offended him, and Marie had to stifle her laughter once more.

She glanced at Logan, who just raised an eyebrow, which was almost enough to set her off again. She elbowed him in the ribs before going to dig through the donut bag.

Only Logan, she reflected, could let her do that without flinching. Most of her friends would touch her without reservation, but always on their terms: if she were to accidentally bump into one, they’d freeze -- just for a fraction of a second, but she was hypersensitive to that kind of thing. Logan just snorted, and ate a chunk of salami.

“I can’t believe you’re eating that for breakfast,” she said quietly. She found a bearclaw at the front of the bag, and seized it with greed.

“I’ve eaten worse. Move it, Bub -- you’re blocking the coffee.”

Magneto’s glare was pure poison, but at least he shifted a little.

“Not a morning person, are you?” Logan asked, with a grin that was absolutely shit-eating. “Or was it just the crouton?”

The coffee-maker must have had a little metal in it, because it shifted just out of his reach. Behind him, Marie snickered quietly.

“Mature,” she muttered, before tearing into her bearclaw.

The sound of the shower roused the others -- all except Ororo, who slept on as though nothing short of the Apocalypse would wake her. Marie wasn’t surprised; she’d flown across the entire Atlantic ocean yesterday.

There was some mild bickering over who would get the shower next, but she ignored it. She hardly cared if the water was cold by the time she got her turn: any bath at all would do. Instead she busied herself brushing Clarice’s hair, which had snarled into a complete rat’s-nest in the night.

She was only halfway through when Kitty phased through the door, practically bouncing with glee. She had a huge paper cup of coffee in her hand, and Marie wondered where she’d gotten it, considering she had no money.

“I found us a van,” she said. “A kidnapping van, I mean. Logan, I’m glad you taught me how to hotwire, because it was seriously easy. It’s parked out back, and it’s so seriously perfect. _And_ I know where Trask is staying -- he won’t be leaving until ten, so we have a little time to get our shit together and go get him.”

Logan eyed her. “Just how much of that have you had?” he asked.

Kitty looked at her cup. “This is my third. I ran into a really nice French guy who runs a coffee shop, and speaks pretty good English. He’s all annoyed because of the traffic and all the other shit the conference has brought in. Says the media people keep breaking his mugs and stealing pastries. He _also_ said the aide of some guy named Trask got pissy when he didn’t have enough eclairs on hand to send to his hotel. Who eats an eclair for breakfast?”

She’d said all this with scarcely a pause for breath, but her words were cut off when a crouton came sailing through the air and landed smack in the middle of her coffee. The liquid splashed a little, leaving dark stains on the carpet.

For a moment, total silence fell. “ _Dude_ ,” she said, looking at it and then glaring at Magneto, who looked a bit too self-satisfied. “There’s some things you just don’t do, and ruining a person’s coffe is one of them.”

“Just fish it out,” Hank said, towelling off his hair.

She glared at him. “That thing’s been in his ear,” she said. “I’m not drinking this after that. It’s tainted.”

That won a round of extremely confused stares. Marie could feel Clarice’s shoulders shaking as she tried desperately not to laugh, but it was a losing battle. 

Magneto just glared at them -- a look that said, quite eloquently, _I hate you all._

\--

Logan actually approved of Kitty’s choice of kidnapping vehicle. It was big, black, old but not _too_ old -- in other words, nice and inconspicuous, especially with all the other black cars currently in town. Six of them plus Trask would be a bit of a squeeze, but not a terrible one.

At the height of summer, finding ski masks had not been easy, and two of them were dark blue instead of black. Ororo still had her black leather uniform, and Clarice loaned hers to Marie. The rest of them went as nondescript as possible, though honestly, this group wouldn’t be too hard to describe no matter _what_ they were wearing.

The Professor was proving to be both a complication and a blessing. The serum Hank habitually injected him with was wearing off, which meant he was having a very difficult time walking, but his powers were also coming back. He insisted Hank keep the rest of it for himself, since he could hardly pass for human if he reverted to his natural, blue-furred form.

In the end, they sat the Professor in the passenger’s seat, where he wouldn’t need to move around to help, and where his disability would not be noticeable. Logan nominated himself as getaway driver, which made all of them extremely nervous. 

“I thought you were going to sit this one out,” Ororo said sternly.

He gave her a slightly withering look. “Can any of you drive like I do?”

“No,” Marie muttered. “Thank God.”

“Are you sure you can go without running anyone over?” Mystique added, very dryly.

“That was _once_ ,” he growled, fiddling with the wires under the dash.

“Actually, sugar, it was twice,” Marie pointed out, almost serenely.

Anybody else he would have snapped at, but since it was Marie, he said, “I only _sort of_ hit you. And I’m still sorry.”

“I know you are. You just don’t have the greatest history of responsible drivin’.”

“ _Responsible_ isn’t what we need,” he snorted. “ _Responsible_ would get us caught.”

“He’s right,” the Professor said. He was such an unexpected ally in this that Logan stared at him a moment. “We need to be able to get away at speed.” 

“Thank you,” Logan said, and actually meant it. “Okay, Trask’s a little person, so Magneto, you grab him, and Raven, you hog-tie him, but loose enough that he can get out easy. Anybody back there who speaks French, argue a lot about what to do with him, but sound like idiots. Anybody who doesn’t, keep your mouth shut. I know how this works.”

“Kidnapped people before, have you?” Magneto asked, more than a little caustic.

“Yes,” Logan said bluntly, “I have, so shut up and listen. We don’t want to make this too obvious, so we’ll try to grab him before he reaches any main roads. Then we’ll take off and drive around for a while.”

“What if he can’t untie himself?” Hank asked.

“If he’s that inept, he deserves whatever he gets,” Mystique said. 

“If he’s that dumb, I pretend to crash the van and we all run. Sooner or later someone’ll find him, and he has a story to tell about his terrible kidnappin’ ordeal. By humans. Normal, vicious, stupid humans.”

“Well, one out of those four is right,” Magneto muttered. Mystique shot him a scowl that could have withered grass, but Kitty kicked him.

“Can it, or I’m getting more croutons,” she said. “You have to sleep sometime.” 

“Oh, the terror,” he said, droll. “You do realize that works both ways.”

Marie snorted. “Did you two turn into five-year-olds when nobody was lookin’? This is serious.”

“No,” Magneto said. “No, it’s really not. The word you’re searching for is ‘ridiculous’.”

The engine coughed, sputtered, and finally roared, cutting off any further sniping. “Everybody shut the hell up,” Logan said. “We’re movin’ out.”

Last night, he’d poured over a tourist map while everyone was sleeping. Paris had a surprising number of back alleys, many of which connected to one another in a bizarre sort of maze. Unlike the main roads, they weren’t choked with traffic, but he kept the van in second gear anyway, not wanting to draw attention before they’d even reached the hotel. They had fifteen minutes before Trask was due to leave, and a very small window of time in which to catch him. 

Mystique had her ropes ready, laid out carefully on the floor in front of her. He wasn’t surprised at how serene she was -- no doubt that even in this time, she’d done this sort of thing before. Marie, unfortunately, was rather tense: he could smell her anxiety, though she sat quite still. Ororo smelled unaccustomedly impatient, and he figured she just wanted to get this over with already. Kidnapping was not exactly common practice for the X-Men. 

The Professor didn’t seem worried at all, which was a step up from his uneasiness before they went to bust Magneto out of the Pentagon. It had to be the gradual return of his powers: while they weren’t at capacity yet, they were getting there, which was a comfort to Logan as well. If they wound up in a tight spot, violence wasn’t going to do them any help in the long term.

They crept up into the alley beside the hotel, and Logan slipped the van into neutral. He had _prey_ now, and the Wolverine was damn near ecstatic about it, even if they couldn’t kill him.

A whole gaggle of people came out of the hotel, men and women in various shades of grey and black suits. Trask, in spite of his height, was fairly easy to spot, because his suit was a very, very 70’s cream -- the kind of thing a person would be embarrassed to see a photo of in the future.

“All right,” he said. “Magneto, get him. Raven, get your ropes ready.”

However, even before Magneto could open the back doors, gunfire broke out. A group of men in -- goddamn, were those _ninja costumes?_ \-- swooped through and grabbed Trask, popping a black bag over his head and booking it for another van. The air still cracked with gunshots, but fewer, the goons just shooting into the air to keep everyone back. The doors slammed, and the van took of with a squeal of tires and a greasy cloud of exhaust.

Logan stared. “You are shittin’ me,” he snarled. “You are goddamn _kiddin’ me!_ ”

“What?” Mystique asked, leaning forward to peer over the seat.

“Somebody else just kidnapped our damn hostage!”

“What?!” Marie cried, scrambling forward herself. Of course there was nothing to be seen but some skid marks on the pavement, and a small herd of terrified people fleeing in different directions.

“You have got to be joking,” Magneto sighed. “Charles, can you find them?”

The Professor’s hand was pressed against his temple, his face sweating with exertion. “No,” he said. “My telepathy’s not strong enough yet.”

There was a brief silence. “Well,” Ororo said, “ _now_ what do we do?”

“We go get our damn hostage,” Marie said. “I dunno about you, but I didn’t get ready for all this just to have somebody else grab him out from under our noses.”

“Why bother?” Magneto asked. “The result will be the same. Perhaps they’ll kill him, and save us all the trouble.”

Logan hated to admit it, but he had a point. Still, like Marie, he hated to see all this effort go to waste. “Professor,” he said, “it’s your call.”

The Professor sat quiet, staring out the window with slightly unfocused eyes. “We go after them,” he said. “I want to know who else would want to kidnap him, and why.”

“Does it matter?” Kitty asked. “I mean, guy like him, he’s probably pissed all kinds of people off.”

“Don’t agree with me,” Magneto said, sounding pained. “It makes me very uncomfortable.”

“Croutons,” she said venemously. “Just you wait.”

Logan shook his head, turning the van around. Given the direction the other van had been going, he was pretty sure he could cut it off. What would happen then, he wasn’t sure, but they’d deal with that when it happened.

\--

Like most diplomats and public figures, Bolivar Trask knew there was always a slight chance of being kidnapped. In his case, he’d always assumed it would be _very_ slight, since not many people knew just what it was he did. Only a few government officials knew about the Sentinel program as of yet, but he did have other, more mainstream weapons programs.

Whatever the reason, he was trapped in the back of a van, trying to breathe through the bag on his head and not panic at the same time. His kidnappers all spoke French, and while he had a semi-decent grasp of the language, they were speaking so rapidly that he couldn’t catch but one word in five.

The van smelled brand-new, which made him think there was money behind this operation. Why wouldn’t they tell him what they wanted? If they’d meant to kill him and nothing more, they could have just put a sniper on the roof of the hotel opposite, rather than stage a very risky daylight kidnapping in front of dozens of witnesses. He was a wealthy man himself -- he could pay his own ransom, if only they’d ask for it. The fact that they’d said nothing of it yet made him very, very worried.

\--

The van was tense and silent as Logan wove through the back streets, everyone either lost in their own thoughts, or not daring to speak them aloud.

Whatever the reason, Erik was grateful for the silence. He thought this entire thing was a fool’s errand, but if they did manage to catch the other kidnappers, it might be possible for him to arrange Trask to have an ‘accident’. The others had guns, and it was very easy for a gun to go off by mistake, fired by a twitchy trigger finger. If he were to be murdered by his human kidnappers...well, who could blame mutants? The woman, Ororo, was right: at the moment, humans really were far more dangerous to one another than mutants were to them. 

Unfortunately, Raven knew him too well. She was watching him, her stare very hard, her eyes flashing yellow. He returned her as bland a look as he could before glancing away, only to find Rogue giving him the exact same expression. Ororo and Kitty shared it as well, and he thought, a little irritably, that if he could see Charles’s face he’d see the same thing.

Dammit.

_I dare you to prove anythi --_

_CRUNCH_

Erik wasn’t the only one who was thrown from his seat as the van suddenly spun a full hundred and eighty degrees. Everybody in the back went flying, crashing together in a groaning heap of swearing. The left side of vehicle had caved in, metal dented by the sheer force of whatever hit them. 

Up front, Logan was snarling like the animal he was. Erik, who had slammed his head on the wheel-well, couldn’t make out what he was saying, but it didn’t matter: in the space of about five seconds, he cut the engine and jumped out the door. Mere moments later there was a scream, and the unmistakable squish of a fist meeting a face.

“What the hell happened?” Rogue groaned, rubbing her shoulder.

Charles must have had his chest squeezed quite hard by the seatbelt upon impact, because he sounded out of breath. “They hit us,” he said, his tone colored with disbelief. “The other van, the kidnappers -- they hit us.”

“...You are fucking kidding me,” Kitty muttered, trying to crawl out from under Ororo’s legs.

“Don’t even.” Erik turned to find Rogue glowering at him. “Don’t even think about it. I’ll drain you dry if I have to.”

“Am I really that transparent?” he asked, a bit vicously.

“ _Yes_ ,” they said -- all of them. Well, dammit.

“If you still mean to kidnap Trask, you’d best get to it,” he said, trying to kick the dented back door open. It really didn’t want to give. “Before Logan murders the dri--”

Gunfire sounded outside the van, two short pistol-shots. The entire lot of them turned to glare at him.

“Don’t look at _me_ ,” he snapped. “I manipulate metal, I can’t see through it.” He gave the door one final kick, but rather than open, it just fell off the hinges, landing on the pavement with somewhat spectacular crash.

Another gunshot, and an extremely high-pitched scream. Erik winced as he peered around the back of the van -- he’d wrenched his back upon impact, and it was going to hurt like a bastard for days, he just knew it -- and almost laughed at what he saw.

Logan, unsurprisingly, was beating the tar out of the driver. While they might be successful kidnappers, they clearly couldn’t fight worth a damn: the driver’s nose was a bloody pulp, and his teeth probably weren’t much better.

The scream, it would seem, had come from one of the other kidnappers: he hopped out the back of their vehicle, one hand pressed to his knee, howling and screaming abuse in French. One of the others actually stood with his hands flapping, utterly useless -- whoever had hired these goons had definitely been fleeced.

A third man, still half-crouched in the van, raised his gun and pointed it at Logan. Much as Erik would have loved for someone to shoot the bastard, it would cause nothing but complications, so the gun flew from the startled mook’s hand, and straight into Erik’s.

Someone -- undoubtedly Raven, given the force of the blow -- kicked him between the shoulders, but he didn’t drop the weapon. He had no intention, now, of _killing_ Trask, but he’d certainly like to shoot the little shit. And sure enough, Trask was still in the van, dazed and disoriented, a black bag clutched in one fist. When Erik came into his view, he stared at the gun in total incomprehension, blinking stupidly.

“No hard feelings,” Erik said, and was gratified to see Trask’s eyes widen in belated understanding as he took aim.

\--

Shitshits _hitshitSHIT._

Well, things had certainly gone to hell with amazing speed. Marie didn’t want to interrupt Logan -- he seemed to be having way too much fun -- but of course Magneto had to go and be...well, him. 

_Stupid kidnappers_ , she thought. _That’s what we are -- stupid kidnappers._ Keeping their supposed role firmly in mind, she screamed, “Don’t shoot the hostage!” at the top of her lungs in French, and slammed into Magneto like a drunk in a mosh pit. She didn’t choke him this time -- she couldn’t afford to be too obvious, or to knock him out -- but she slapped his face long enough to feel the pull of her mutation dragging at his.

He went grey, eyes totally losing focus, and she frantically gestured to the others to come get him. She had no idea if their van was even drivable after the accident, but she certainly hoped so, because she was pretty sure absolutely nobody was going to want to haul him through the street on foot. She definitely didn’t imagine how deliberately Kitty let his head hit the pavement when she grabbed his left arm.

“Logan! C’mon, we gotta go! Fuck the hostage!”

“No thanks,” Kitty muttered, staggering as she dragged.

“Dammit, Logan, I _mean_ it! Don’t make me come over there!”

It was, perhaps, her tone rather than her words that got through to him. He paused mid-punch, and his expression, when he saw the group of them, was so pained and incredulous that she almost laughed. “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” he groaned, dropping the driver, who hit the street with an unpleasantly damp squish. “Are we not even botherin' with Trask?”

“I’ve got him,” Mystique said. Either she’d hit Trask, or tranquilized him; he was breathing, but he wasn’t moving, and there was a bag over his head. Huh. They hadn’t thought of that.

Logan growled. “Fine, bring him too. Everybody, in.”

That was easier said than done. Fortunately, with Magneto’s borrowed power, Marie could hold the broken door up, and keep the rest of the world from seeing their small, stolen weapons manufacturer. 

“All right, we’ve got him,” Hank said. “So now what?”

Marie didn’t have an answer, and from the resounding silence, she didn’t think anybody else did, either. 

“I don’t know about anyone else,” Kitty said eventually, “but I really need to pee.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because of course nothing can possibly go right for this group. The people behind the inept ninja-wannabes will turn up eventually. Meanwhile, Trask’s day is only going to get worse.


	7. Breather. Sort of.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Logan and Rogue continue to be adorable, Professor Xavier’s wealth comes in handy, and everybody gets a breather. Except Kitty, who gets squished.

Eventually, Logan just boosted another van, this one an unremarkable olive green. They swung back by the hotel to pick up Clarice and all their stuff. However, once that was done, they were still left with the problem of what to do with Trask.

Fortunately, the man in question was still deeply unconscious, and according to Raven, would remain so for a while. At least he wouldn’t be able to hear them argue.

“Professor, can’t you just edit his memories and stuff him somewhere?” Clarice asked. When she heard the story, she hadn’t even bothered not trying to laugh. It didn’t look like she was at all bothered by the glares she got, either.

“I would, if it weren’t for the other kidnappers,” the Professor said. “They might well kill him.”

Marie fought a sigh. One of the things she most respected about the Professor was his own respect for the sanctity of life, human and otherwise, but in this case, it was damn inconvenient.

“So what do we do with him?” Ororo asked, and though her tone was even, Marie could tell she found the idea just as aggravating.

“I have a property, about two hours east of here. So long as we keep Trask confined to one room, and wear ski masks when we deal with him, he shouldn’t be able to identify us or his surroundings later. I admit,” he added, “I would like a chance to look into his mind in more depth than I could in a few hours. I want to know just what made him what he is. The sheer amount of hatred a person must hold, to make something like the Sentinels....”

Well...put like that, Marie could understand. She was curious herself, but she still had reservations. There were so very, very many ways this could go disastrously wrong, and given their luck since everyone from the future had got here...well. She felt pretty justified in worrying.

Since they no longer needed to drive like lunatics, Hank had taken over at the wheel. Logan might grumble about what he called “pansy drivin’” (Marie was more inclined to call it _sane_ driving), but he otherwise seemed content to sit in back next to her, her head rested against his shoulder. Now that her adrenaline was crashing, she found herself exhausted, and with him beside her she actually dared close her eyes.

“Sleep, darlin’,” he said, pulling her closer. It said a hell of a lot, that he was willing to be that affectionate around other people -- especially since some of them were still relative strangers. Whatever the reason, she was content to shut her eyes and listen to the steady, reassuring sound of his heartbeat. It wasn’t long before the sound lulled her to sleep.

\--

Kitty, sitting at the back of the van, cast a glance at Logan and Rogue. No, she wasn’t surprised at all, but she still looked at Ororo and raised her eyebrow. To her surprise, Ororo returned the look with a sly smile, and actually gave her a thumbs-up.

Magneto stirred, and looked like he was about to say something...well, like him, so Kitty kicked him. Hard. He shot her a glower, even as Mystique strangled back a laugh. “Hush,” Kitty hissed. “Remember: croutons.”

That made his stare even blacker, but he subsided -- though she suspected that had far more to do with Rogue’s attack than any threat she herself might make. She rolled her eyes, but when she looked at Mystique, she found the other woman smirking at her. Maybe, Kitty thought, this was all shit she’d want to do herself, if it wasn’t beneath her dignity. As far as Kitty was concerned, dignity was for losers, and she was perfectly happy to act childish if the situation called for it. In this time, without the constant threat of death looming, she could get away with it. God knew that in the future, it had been years since any of them had had any fun.

Given what Mystique was like in the future, Kitty was quite surprised to find that she liked this past version of her. While there was something tragic about her, and while she contained a disturbing amount of anger just beneath the surface, Kitty thought she could see the woman Mystique had been when the Professor knew her. If abusing Magneto made her smile...well, so much the better. Two birds with one stone, and all that.

She looked at Trask, who was still a very inert lump on the floor. Like the Professor, she wondered just what had made him such a monster. For the first time, she also wondered what had happened to him in the future -- he’d be a very old man, in the time she’d come from, but was he even still alive, or had someone taken him out? When the Sentinels first started attacking the humans, a lot of government officials had been murdered, whether they’d had anything to do with the program or not.

God, she wished she could pace. All the coffee she’d drunk earlier was coming back to haunt her: there was no way she’d be able to nap, even if she wanted to. She was jittery, her feet tapping lightly on the floor, her hands unsteady. She’d managed to go to the bathroom when they picked up Clarice, but she knew she’d have to pee again long before anyone else did. It was probably a good thing she’d wound up with a crouton in her third cup, even if it _was_ disgusting.

Croutons. If she was to survive the next ordeal with her sanity intact, she needed to get her hands on some. She briefly considered if she ought to feel guilty for tormenting Magneto as she did. It was _very_ brief, however; he was a little fuckface who had no qualms about retaliating. Honestly, by keeping him so irritated, she was doing the world a favor: if he was constantly annoyed, he wasn’t planning something stupid. She’d have to see if she could recruit Clarice to help her.

\--

The longer the drive ran, the more restless most of them grew, but not Logan. As far back as he could remember, he’d been good at sitting still for extended periods, if the situation called for it. The fact that Marie was asleep with her head on his shoulder just gave him more impetus to do so. Poor woman was exhausted.

Though she was now in her thirties, he could still see echoes of the kid he’d found hiding in the back of his trailer. Her face had been a little too sharp then, too, though nothing like it was now, and her eyes had been far too old for a girl her age. They were even more so, since he’d first found her in this time: she’d peered into hell, and had somehow come out the other side with her sanity still intact.

He didn’t dare stray too far from her here. Having no idea what had thrown them all into 1973, he had no way of knowing if it might try to draw them back at some point. If that happened, he wasn’t going to let her get trapped in the camps again -- and if she was too far away when they were snatched to the future, he was afraid she must might. While kidnapping Trask may well have already changed that future, he wasn’t going to count on it.

Though he would never, ever admit it, part of him agreed with Magneto: it might be best just to kill the bastard. He only became a martyr because he was killed by a mutant -- if he was just the victim of a botched kidnapping, or ordinary murder, why would anybody think to blame mutants?

He knew Kitty was halfway on his side, too. While he doubted she’d want them to actually kill him, she certainly didn’t seem to have a problem with letting someone else do it. Mystique -- Raven -- was also a given. The real issue was that even if he talked the rest of them around to it, the Professor would never agree, and he’d never forgive them if they did it anyway. The future depended on the school: Logan couldn’t afford to disenchant him about his own kind.

Marie stirred a little, frowning in her sleep. She might not remember it, but she’d had nightmares in the hotel, at one point thrashing in the tub so violently he was afraid she’d hurt herself. It was why he hand’t gotten any sleep himself -- he’d stayed awake so he could calm her, even if she never woke when he did.

There was no way she’d ever want to have a nightmare in front of everyone else, so he gently shook her. She blinked at him, a little dazed, and he pulled one of the few remaining donuts out of the bag.

“Eat that,” he said, shoving it into her hands. He realized it had become something of a broken record in the last couple days, but even with a few good meals under her belt, she still looked almost like a walking skeleton.

She smiled, as though reading his mind. “Sure thing, sugar.” He would have just stuffed the whole thing in his mouth, but she actually ate like a civilized person.

On the floor, Trask groaned. “I can pay ransom,” he said, slurring a little on the last word. “Anything you want.”

“We’re not interested in money,” the Professor said, before anyone else could speak. “We’re keeping you safe from the others.”

“Others?” He was trying to sit up, but Raven had tied his hands behind his back, so he was having a hard time of it.

“The first group that grabbed you. The men in the ridiculous ninja costumes.” There was a pause, in which Logan was certain the Professor was reading Trask’s mind. “They want information on the Macross Missile program.”

“How did you know about that?” Trask asked. Though his voice was muffled by the bag on his head, he sounded woozy.

“Back to sleep,” Raven said, before anyone could answer. She jabbed a needle into his neck, and actually bothered catching him before he could land on his face. “What?” she asked, when the others stared at her. “Wiping his mind won’t do any good if he has a broken nose.”

Logan had to concede her point, though he did it silently. No sense in giving anyone the satisfaction otherwise.

\--

Ororo wasn’t surprised to find the Professor’s ‘property’ included a mansion that could rival the school. While he’d never talked much about his childhood, they’d known that his parents had been fabulously wealthy, that his father had died young, and that his mother was so distant he’d managed to bring another child into the house without her so much as noticing. She wondered if he kept this mansion in case he ever needed to relocate the school.

It was dusty inside, though not so much as she would have expected. He explained that the place did have caretakers, but they did only the bare necessities require to maintain the house and grounds. He hadn’t been here himself since he was a child.

Logan hauled Trask inside like the proverbial sack of potatoes, depositing him in a large room that the Professor said was normally a pantry. It had no windows, but it was almost as big as one of the bedrooms in the mansion in New York: they were hardly locking Trask in a tiny closet. The Professor even had Logan haul down a matress and some blankets.

The house had no food, but the Professor called a grocery order into the village store. The rest of them simply took advantage of the space, spreading out to explore and get away from one another.

Ororo went out into the garden. Ironically, the grounds of this house were better-kept than the one in New York, the lawn mowed and bushes trimmed. There was a large magnolia smack in the center of one garden patch, and she went to sit under it, grateful for the tranquility. It was as warm here as it had been in Paris, the sun bringing out the scent of the magnolia flowers.

Personally, she didn’t at all approve of what they were doing, but once the Professor set his mind to something, there was no arguing with him. Well, no arguing successfully. She would have trusted the older Professor implicitly, but this one was close to twenty years younger than her. She couldn’t help but question his judgment, however unfair that might be. Which was a touch ironic, considering the kidnapping had been her (admittedly drunken) idea. 

It will work, she told herself. They’d force it, if they had to.

\--

Hank had gone to look for medical supplies, and Kitty, after a glance at him and Raven, unceremoniously shoved the latter after him. Hank was so obviously infatuated that it was a little painful to watch, and Raven’s hard eyes always seemed to soften when she looked at him, so maybe that would get them both out of the way. Kitty was not averse to playing wingman, whether anyone wanted her to be one or not.

Logan and Rogue had disappeared somewhere, so she grabbed Clarice and they went exploring. She had to work off the caffeine jitters somehow.

“You know,” she said, as they passed through a massive ballroom, “if we do change the future, maybe we could con the Professor into turning this into another school,” she said. “It would be way easier for the kids from this side of the Atlantic. And it’s not like there aren’t a whole bunch of us who could come here as teachers.”

“At this point, I still can’t imagine any other future,” Clarice said. She threw out a portal, probably just for something to do. “I mean, especially if Logan really is back here, like the rest of us. We won’t know until we get there the slow way, and we’ll be old by then.”

It was not the first time the thought had occurred to Kitty. She’d always relentlessly shoved it to the back of her mind, and she did so again. “I can’t even worry about that right now. If we do have to live through it that way, at least we’ve got plenty of time to change the future. If I was still there, keeping Logan here, he would have only had a few days. I couldn’t have stayed awake forever.”

Clarice snorted. “After all that coffee, you’ll probably be awake the next few days anyway. Did you really stuff that crouton in Magneto’s ear?”

“He had it coming,” Kitty muttered darkly. “How weird is it, seeing him and the Professor so young? In the future, they always seemed more than human. Mutant. Whatever. Now they’re...well, like us. I never thought I’d see the Professor indecisive about anything, and I sure as hell never would have thought Magneto could be so childish. Don’t even start,” she added, holding up a finger. “I know, I know, I’m not helping. Still. My point stands. I’m not the one who started the bread war.”

Clarice gave her an entirely deadpan stare. “You had the Professor put croutons on the grocery list, didn’t you?”

Kitty tried not to laugh. She really did. “I can’t believe he _let_ me,” she snickered. “I don’t think he’s as above it all as he’d want us to believe. I mean, with that haircut, how could he be?”

Clarice burst out laughing, and jumped through her portal. She came out at the far side of the room, and immediately threw another one. It was, Kitty thought, almost like a dance -- which was fitting, since they were in a ballroom. When was the last time Clarice got to throw portals for fun, and not to escape imminent death? Shit, any of them last used their mutations just for the hell of it?

She grinned, and hopped through the next portal herself. Clarice had, by necessity, become so adept at this that keeping up with her was a real challenge. It was definitely a good way to burn off excess energy.

She wasn’t sure just how long they did that, but she was actually starting to wear out when she leapt through one and crashed right into Hank, who in turn staggered backward into Raven. Predictably, he blushed like a fire engine, making certain Raven was fine before he bothered checking on Kitty. She arched an eyebrow (years ago, she’d spent a week teaching herself how to do that, since Logan seemed to get so much mileage out of it), and grinned. Well. 

“Professor said the food’s here,” Hank said, rubbing the back of his neck. “We should eat dinner and feed Trask, and talk about what to do next.”

Kitty wasn’t quite sure what there was to talk about. The Professor wanted to pick Trask’s brain -- literally -- so did they really need to do anything else? He obviously thought so, and she had a feeling she wasn’t going to like whatever he might suggest.

She glanced at Clarice, who looked like she was thinking the same thing. At least they’d had a little fun.

\--

Erik still felt absolutely terrible. When they’d arrived, he’d crashed on one of the unmade beds and slept, not waking until Ororo came to tell him dinner was on. While he wasn’t sure just how long he’d been asleep, late evening had fallen, so it had to have been a few hours at least.

As much as he really did not want to see any of them, he was hungry, and he probably ought to know what they planned on doing with Trask. 

He really, really needed to get Marie on his side, which also meant he had to win over Logan. His continued existence literally depended on her goodwill -- he could only count himself lucky that she wasn’t the sort of person that...well, _he_ was.

Unfortunately, he honestly had no idea how to do that. All he knew, as he leaned heavily on the railing to get down the stairs, was that he might not survive another such attack. Oh, she seemed to know what she was doing, to know when to pull away, but he wasn’t willing to literally bet his life on it.

Behaving with Trask would probably be a decent start. If he could live without breaking any of the bastard’s limbs, that would surely count as a point in his favor -- with the two of them, and possibly with Clarice and Ororo. Raven would never trust him, no matter what he did, and he doubted Kitty would ever stop attacking him with bread products, but Hank would take his cue from Charles.

The problem, of course, was that Charles could read his mind -- could, and surely would, to make sure he wasn’t about to try anything less than ethical. Just now, Erik had no idea what to do about that. He was certainly in no condition to think of any at the moment.

He was so lightheaded that he had to pause at the bottom of the stairs, sitting with his head pressed against his knees. He felt so _weak_ , and he hated it. It and, at the moment, the entire world.

Something poked the top of his head. He didn’t look up until it did it again, harder this time. It took a moment for his eyes to focus, but when they did, he found Kitty standing in front of him, pointing an ornate cane at his forehead.

“Take this,” she said. “And hurry it up already. Professor doesn’t want to let us eat until you get there.”

Had he been any less exhausted, he would have had quite a few things to say about that. As it was, he took the cane in his unsteady right hand, and somehow levered himself to his feet.

Kitty eyed him, inspecting his unsteady balance. “Dude, don’t go and die on me,” she said. “I can’t throw shit at you if you’re dead.”

“How wonderful it is to be needed,” he said dryly, taking a few careful steps. It was a good thing he had the cane, because he almost certainly have fallen without it.

“Hey, I’m pretty sure the Professor would cry,” she said, keeping pace with him, as though she actually thought she’d be of any use if he lost his footing. “And that would just be wrong. So very, very wrong.”

“I somehow doubt he would care much,” Erik snapped. He paused and shut his eyes, his head spinning.

“He wouldn’t get so pissed at you if he didn’t think you were his friend,” she pointed out. “Hell, I don’t think he’d leave you conscious if he didn’t at least want to hear you talk. He might not want to talk _to_ you much, but that doesn’t mean he’s not listening.”

She made sense, as much as he didn’t want to admit it. He would certainly never tell her so.

“Are you actually gonna move, or do I need to go get the Professor’s wheelchair? You look a little green.”

He was going to snap at her. He really was. Unfortunately, his vision chose that moment to go grey. Balance utterly deserted him, and consciousness fled even as he fell. The last thing he was aware of was a terrified, “Oh, _shit!_ ” from Kitty, and then darkness took him.

\--

Motherfucker. Mother _god damn FUCKER_ , Kitty was never, _ever_ doing the Professor a favor, ever again. _Ever_. She didn’t care how many croutons he provided her with -- some things just weren’t worth it.

To her credit, she’d tried to catch Magneto when he fell. She really had. Unfortunately, he was almost a full foot taller than her, and quite a bit heavier. The result was that they both fell, and she cracked her head all over again -- at the back, where it hit the hardwood, and on her forehead, which got hit by his chin. If the dampness at her hairline was any indication, it had opened up the wound that was already there. Dark stars danced behind her vision, and her stomach juked left. _Ow._

She tried to get to her feet, and completely failed. Great. “Little help?” she called, knowing that Logan would hear her, even if nobody else did.

She scowled at Magneto, who was still very much unconscious. “I hate you,” she growled. “I hate you _so much_. Just wait ‘til I have more croutons.”

Logan, predictably, laughed his ass off, but he helped Kitty to the dining-room, and manhandled Magneto into the Professor’s borrowed wheelchair. Okay, _him_ she’d do a favor for later, as long as it didn’t involve choking someone.

Hank fussed over the bandage on her forehead, and she gave the Professor a baleful glare. “Next time? So not my job.”

At least he looked like he felt guilty. “Agreed,” he said. “Sorry, Kitty. I keep forgetting you’re so --”

“Don’t say it,” she muttered. “I know I’m short. I’m also starving, so let’s eat, okay?”

“Okay,” the Professor said. “But the question of the hour is: what do we do with Trask? I know what I mean to try, but does anyone else want to do something that doesn’t involve violence?”

“Does havin' him drop acid count as violence?” Logan asked, ignoring when Rogue elbowed him in the ribs.

The Professor actually rolled his eyes. “Yes, Logan, it does. Fine. We’ll keep him fed and I’ll look into his mind, and we’ll drop him back in Paris in three days.”

“You have a TV here?” Rogue asked. “We should probably keep tabs on how many people are looking for him.”

“Good idea. Meanwhile, enjoy yourselves. Just please don’t destroy my house while you’re doing it.”

Far back at the other end of the house, something chose that instant to explode. Hank went pale, leapt to his feet, and fled, almost running into the doorjamb as he did. Raven sighed, and followed a moment later.

“I think I know what that was,” she said. “Don’t worry about it.”

Somehow, Kitty was not reassured, and she didn’t think anyone else was, either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry, Kitty, I really am. I'm not sorry, Trask, because you're an asshole and deserve everything I do to you.


	8. Day One, Part One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Logan and Rogue continue to be sweet, Hank is not a morning person, Magneto gets some good advice, and spiders happen.

Marie’s eyelids were growing heavy well before dinner was over. At least tonight she could sleep in a real bed, rather than a bathtub -- the Professor had told them where the linen closet was, and they’d all raided it for blankets and pillows.

The room she’d picked was small, at least by the house’s standards -- which still made it roughly the size of the living room in a decent apartment. The walls had a very strange sort of wallpaper, white with slender silver lines that formed the silhouette of trees. There was nothing at all dark about it, but neither was its brightness sterile. She’d had more than enough of both, in the camps.

She took another shower, just because she could, the water just short of scalding. She’d been cold for so long, cold and filthy, that being warm and clean remained a novelty. Brushing her hair had likewise also acquired rarity value. In the camps, they’d initially kept her hair cut short, but after a while had stopped bothering. It was almost to the length it had been before she was take.

Someone rapped on the bedroom door, and she was totally unsurprised to find it was Logan. He’d been hovering over her like a mother hen, and she wasn’t certain if it was irritating, endearing, or both. On the one hand, it had been a very long time since she’d had anyone actually care about her wellbeing, but on the other, it made her feel a bit like a child.

He was carrying a bowl, and she could smell chocolate even through the hand-towel draped over it. “Kitty made you a thing,” he said, a little gruffly, and she had to fight a smile. No matter how much Logan cared, he wasn’t -- and probably never would be -- very good about actually expressing emotion. “Well, she tried. It was mostly Clarice. Kitty’s in no condition to be let near a kitchen, and Clarice wanted to make sure you wouldn’t get poisoned.”

“What is it?” Marie asked, squeezing the last of the water from her hair.

“Chocolate mousse. Said it’d be good for your enorphins or somethin’.” He quite obviously had no clue what that meant, but he clearly knew it was a good thing.

“She’s right,” she said. “Gimme. I hope you brought two spoons, ‘cause there’s no way I can eat all this by myself.”

He gave her a lopsided grin. “Clarice said the same thing. Dunno quite what she meant when she said it was ‘rich’, though.”

Marie laughed. “You’ll find out. A little goes a long way.” Then again, with him it might not. This was, after all, a man who ate salami for breakfast.

The room was so large that it actually had a sofa beneath the window, and she led him to it. So far from the village, there was no light pollution from streetlights to dim the night sky, and it was a mass of stars. In the future, there were no stars: the perpetual smoke from the camps made sure of that.

She took a big bite of the mousse, and let out a long, happy sigh. It really was rich, and still quite warm. “Did you find out what Hank blew up?” she asked.

Logan snorted, carefully trying some of the mousse himself. His surprised reaction almost made her laugh. “He won’t say. Smells a lot like sulfur, though. Him and Raven are too shifty for their own good. Professor’ll get it out of ’em sooner or later.”

“Kitty’s tryin’ to play matchmaker,” Marie said, taking another, smaller bite. The last thing she wanted to do was gorge and make herself sick. “God help ’em both. Dunno why the Professor thinks this group of lunatics can actually last three days without destroyin’...well, everythin’. At least Ororo’s got her head on straight.”

He arched an eyebrow. “And we don’t?”

Now it was Marie who snorted. “Sugar, do you really need to ask that question? Neither of us has the best history of makin’ smart decisions. If you don’t wanna murder everyone by day two, I’ll be really surprised. Me, I don’t wanna stay still. Maybe never will again.”

Logan sobered. “You know you can tell me what happened there, if you want,” he said.

She shivered. “Maybe someday. Just...not yet.” And that was a very big ‘maybe’. She might never be able to put it into words. She might never want to.

He set the bowl and his spoon on the windowsill. “C’mere,” he said, carefully drawing her closer to him. She rested her head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat. “I’ve been there,” he said. “Been experimented on -- you know that. I might not know exactly what you went through, but I can guess. You move past it, eventually.”

He didn’t mention that the nightmares probably wouldn’t ever go away, but he didn’t have to. She’d almost died because of them, when they’d first met. Nightmares she could live with, as long as everything else went.

“How long does it take?” she asked, her voice quiet and small.

“Different for everybody.” He started rubbing soothing circles on her back. “None of us has gone through quite the same thing. ’Ro, Kitty, and Clarice have all seen their own share of shit -- they’ve all got nightmares, too -- but not like you and me.”

Marie shut her eyes. “I can’t stand the smell of smoke,” she said abruptly. “Somethin’ was always burnin’, in the camps. I never asked what it was. Think I already knew.”

Logan’s hand paused, but only for a moment. He said nothing, though, for which she was grateful. “The people, the ones who ran the camps, I think they made ’em like World War II concentration camps on purpose, only worse, ’cause of all the modern technology.”

“You’d know, wouldn’t you,” he said quietly. He knew how her mutation worked -- he knew that she had a lot of Magneto’s nastier memories. It had taken quite a lot of work with the Professor, to cage that personality. It was the first one she’d successfully contained, and after that, everyone else seemed downright easy. She didn’t want to tell Logan that she’d got a refresher of them, in the last two days.

“We have to change the future,” she said. “As it is now, even if we win, if we kill the Sentinels and the people who run the camps, the survivors’re all gonna be fucked up bad. Who knows if we’d get another Magneto out of it -- or, hell, more than one. World wouldn’t survive.”

“We’ll do it,” he said, sounding so assured that she had to take comfort from it. “Like you said, we might be a buncha lunatics, but we’re _stubborn_ lunatics. I still wanna give Trask an acid trip, though,” he added, mostly to himself.

Marie actually laughed. “Never taken acid, but I’ve heard what it’s like. Where would you even get it, out here?”

“Darlin’, it’s 1973. Shit’s everywhere. I’d try to get Hank to make some, but I know he’d just go runnin’ to the Professor. Kid’s kind of a narc.”

“Still can’t see him and Doctor McCoy as the same person,” Marie said. “And not just ’cause this one doesn’t have blue fur. He’s even more different than the Professor, and that’s sayin’ somethin’.”

“No shit.” Logan paused, thoughtful. “Professor probably wouldn’t trust me to go to town, not after what I said about acid, but I bet you we could get Kitty to go if we told her to get enough to dose Magneto, too. She’s beyond pissed at him right now, and hell, I’d pay to see that mysef.”

She sat up enough to look at him. “What’d he do _now_?”

“Professor sent her to get him to dinner, and he passed out halfway there and squashed her. Professor’s on her shit list right now, too, but she’d never poison him with anythin’.”

Marie winced. “That’s my fault, isn’t it? Halfway killin’ him, and all.”

“ _His_ fault,” Logan snarked. “He didn’t have to try and shoot Trask. Although, and I’d never, ever tell him this, I can’t blame him. I just know that keepin’ that little bastard here’s gonna blow up in our faces.”

“Hopefully not literally, like whatever Hank’s makin’,” she said. “Ten bucks says his eyebrows don’t survive until the end of this.”

He laughed. “Not gonna take a bet I’m sure I’d lose.” He ran his fingers through her tangled hair. “Go get your hairbrush, will you? You’ve got a damn big mess here.”

“You sure do know how to compliment a woman,” she said dryly. “Fine. Don’t eat all that mousse while I’m gone.”

\--

Since they weren’t sure just what the Professor might -- or might not -- do about Hank and his explosions, Clarice dispatched Kitty to investigate. Considering Kitty had taken some rather powerful painkillers after dinner, Ororo thought that was a terrible idea, but Clarice declared she was too worried to sleep until she knew just what the hell was going on at the western end of the mansion.

“I know he can’t blow the whole thing up,” she said, when Ororo protested, “but he _could_ burn it down. Could you sleep, knowing that’s possible?”

It was a fairly flimsy excuse, and even Kitty knew it, but she was curious, too. Opiates made most people sleepy, but they gave her the jitters -- and that was on top of all the coffee she’d had earlier.

So she crept through the walls, flashlight in hand, pausing to investigate the more interesting rooms she found. She got quite distracted by the library, which actually had the rolling ladders you saw in old movies. She ended up wasting quite a bit of time zooming around on them, vaguely wishing she had telekinesis like Jean.

By the time she actually reached Hank’s makeshift lab, it was well after midnight, and the man in question was gone. Even drugged as she was, she knew better than to actually touch anything, so she confined herself to strictly visual snooping.

There didn’t seem to be any single recognizable project. The house, unsurprisingly, didn’t appear to have had any actual scientific equipment: Hank (and presumably Raven) had liberated a lot of dishes from the kitchen -- measuring cups, steel mixing bowls, and some dark, circular things Kitty suspected were dish-warmers. The entire room reeked like sulphur and something else, something harsh and metallic that left a nasty, astringent taste at the back of her throat. There was also a rather impressive scorch-mark on the wall.

What the hell were they _doing_ in here? And why? There was no point in building a bomb, since there was nothing they could really want one for -- and in any case, she didn’t see any practical bomb-making materials.

Whatever they were doing, it didn’t look likely to explode again for no reason. All the burners were cold, and nothing was glowing or bubbling. They were probably safe -- for now. She’d go lurk in the air duct in the morning, to watch Hank in action.

Task completed, she hopped down to the kitchen, only a little unsteadily. Since Trask was in the pantry, they’d put all their groceries on one of the long granite counters, and she dug through the bags until she found the packet of croutons. She had plans for these babies.

\--

When Erik woke, he still wasn’t well, but at least he no longer felt like half-baked death.

It was very early -- the sun hadn’t yet crested the horizon, and the dawn was clear and grey. If he hurried, maybe he could get breakfast out of the way before anyone else was up.

Fortunately, he no longer needed the cane, so he could move quietly down the stairs. Unfortunately, Ororo had beaten him to the punch: she was frying eggs at the stove, humming quietly to herself.

Well, it could be worse. She could have been literally any of her other companions from the future. Of the five of them, she was the only one who didn’t grate on his psyche like steel wool, and he felt safe ignoring her as he rummaged through the refrigerator.

“Plans for today?” she asked, deftly flipping an egg.

“No,” he said, and for now he actually meant it. “Having the life drained out of you twice in as many days leaves you with just a bit of a hangover.”

She snorted quietly. “Stop provoking Rogue. She doesn’t like using her power, but she will if she feels like she has no choice.” Setting the spatula down, she turned to face him. “I’m going to give you some advice,” she said. “Don’t try to be cunning. You need to remember that we all know you in the future -- we know how you think. Now, even after everything, Charles wants to think better of you, and you could very likely fool him, but the rest of us? Logan would happily kill you, Rogue doesn’t trust you, Clarice is afraid of you, and Kitty is, at present at least, extremely angry at you. I don’t trust you, either, but I think you have it in you to change. You are not yet too old and set in your ways.”

“Why would you say that?” he asked, a touch of derision in his tone.

“I’m older than them,” she said, calm. “I’m older than you. You’ve seen quite a bit in your life, but not half so much as I have.” She gave him a slightly enigmatic smile, before turning to tip the eggs out of the pan and onto her plate. “Logan and Rogue have both been experimented on,” she said, seemingly apropros of nothing. “You all have that in common. If you ever want them to trust you, use that.”

Now Erik was quite honsetly bewildered. “Why would you want them to trust me?”

Ororo turned back to him, carrying her plate to the table. “In the future, from everything I have seen of you, you are most dangerous when you’re alone,” she said. “You draw people to you, evil people who care more about hurting others than supporting your cause. In the end, it brings you and everyone else nothing but misery.” She gave him another smile. “Basically, you need to make better friends. But they have to be able to trust you.”

He shook his head, filling the kettle at the sink and setting it on the still-warm burner. “Can I trust _them_?” he asked. “Can I trust any of you?”

“When Rogue gives her loyalty to something, it’s absolute. Logan will take his cue from her. Kitty might not like you, but she does like throwing things at you -- she’d work to keep you alive, if for that reason alone. Clarice will come around when the others do. As for me, I don’t trust you yet, but I trust that I might someday be able to.”

She really was a strange person. “If it helps, I had no intention of actually killing Trask,” he said, digging out the tea. “I just wanted to hurt him.”

“If you get Charles to vouch for you, you’ll convince the others. It will be a start.”

Hank shuffled in before Erik could respond. His hair stuck up in a good four different directions, and his eyelids were so heavy that at first Erik wondered if he was even awake. He certainly moved rather like a zombie, even when he plugged in the coffee-pot and set about fixing some. When Ororo said good morning, all he did was grunt, and he stayed silent the entire time the pot dripped. Erik just shook his head, and set about making his own breakfast.

Clarice was next, portaling into the kitchen so abruptly that he almost choked on his toast. She was somewhat disgustingly chipper, which earned her a black look from Hank. It only grew blacker when she asked him what he’d blown up last night.

“It’s a surprise,” he grumbled. “Don’t go poking around in there. It isn’t safe.”

“Oh, I won’t,” Clarice said, something in her tone suggesting that if she hadn’t already done it, _someone_ had. “Has anyone fed Trask yet? No? I’ll make an omelette. Anyone else want some? Anyone?”

“Have you already had coffee?” Erik asked. He could feel a headache coming on.

“Just a morning person,” she chirped. “I mean, after I’ve actually had a good night’s sleep. Crashing on a hotel room floor doesn’t count.”

“If you could please keep the volume _down_ ,” he said, taking a large swig of tea and hoping the caffeine kicked in soon.

“Sure thing.” Of course, she immediately started humming, but it was better than a stream of chatter.

Kitty staggered in, wincing as she walked. Her forehead had bloomed into a truly spectacular bruise that she hadn’t had yesterday, and she noticeably favored her left leg. She’d probably been up to some sort of opiate-fueled adventure last night, and he hoped it hadn’t been anything destructive. She also, he noticed -- and he was quite sure she hadn’t -- had a spider the size of a fist crawling on top of her head.

“You have a passenger,” he said, pointing with his toast.

“Huh?” She reached up, and screamed bloody murder when her hand made contact with the spider. It went flying, and somehow managed to land smack in the middle of Hank’s coffee -- very briefly, since its impact actually knocked the cup over.

Hank let out a yelp, scrambling backward so fast he tipped his chair over, and even Erik twitched. He had no problem with spiders, but that thing really was stupidly oversized.

“That’s not a spider, that’s goddamn land-Cthulu!” Kitty shrieked, flailing as she checked her hair and clothes for any further arachnids. “What the hell?! I didn’t think freaking France had spiders the size of my hand!” She staggered, and actually phased back through the wall behind her.

Clarice hadn’t made a sound, but she’d grabbed a clean frying pan. When she approached the table, however, she paused, clearly unwilling to get close enough to actually hit the thing. She caught her foot on one of the table’s legs, which made the spider shoot forward -- right toward Erik, who, to his everlasting embarrassment, scrambled away himself. It wasn’t _his_ fault the creature was so ridiculously huge. He just didn’t want it getting into his tea. Really.

“Oh God, where did it go?” Kitty had phased back through the wall just in time to see it take off with the speed of a racecar. “Clarice, step on it!”

“I’m _barefoot!_ I’m not going anywhere near that thing!”

Ororo rolled her eyes. “It’s more afraid of you than you are of it,” she said, rising and following it.

“Then it must be ready to pee its pants,” Kitty muttered, watching with sick fascination as Ororo casually picked the spider up and carried it to the sliding-glass door. Though he would never admit it out loud, Erik wasn’t sure he could have done that.

“...I think I need new coffee,” Hank said. He certainly sounded awake now. “And a new cup.”

“Coffee?” Kitty asked. She was still clawing at her hair, though if she’d had any other eight-legged companions, she surely would have discovered by now. “Give it.” She hobbled after him, grimacing when her leg twisted in a somewhat unnatural way.

“Why are you limping?” Erik asked, resuming his seat. At least the spider hadn’t run over what was left of his toast.

She shot him an extraordinarily dirty look, even by her standards. “You don’t remember?” she said. “You keeled over last night, and I made the epically stupid mistake of trying to catch you before you broke your face. Three guesses how _that_ ended,” she said, gesturing to her bruised forehead.

Surprisingly -- and somewhat alarmingly -- he actually felt sorry for her. He was hardly going to _say_ so, however. He’d settle for not complaining the next time she threw croutons at him. “You’re rather resilient, for a tiny person,” he said instead, and tried not to laugh when her scowl deepened still further.

“ _Hush_ , you. Hank, coffee. Now.”

Rather amusingly, Hank hopped -- literally hopped -- out of her way. He still looked as though he were about two steps away from heart failure.

“The hell was all that screamin’ about?” Logan demanded, as he stomped into the kitchen. “Someone get axe-murdered down here?”

“Kitty had a spider the size of a Volkswagon in her hair,” Clarice said. “Better not tell Rogue, or she’ll never sleep again.”

“She don’t sleep much _now_ ,” he muttered. “Hank, I need you to go wake up the Professor. Need him to talk to Rogue.” His tone made it clear that doing otherwise was not an option.

“Can you help me first?” Clarice asked. “I made some eggs and toast for Trask, but I don’t want to open the door myself, just in case he tries to run.”

“Why the hell would you go to all that trouble?” Logan asked, mystified.

“Because if we feed him good, he might cooperate better,” she said, as though it were obvious.

“Well,” Erik said. “Feed him _well_. English isn’t even my first language and I know that.”

“Stuff it, Magnet Man,” Logan said. “Fine. Better give him some water while we’re at it. Christ only knows what he’s made of all that screaming.”

“Maybe I should do it,” Ororo said. “You’re rather...distinctive, Clarice. It’s perhaps better that he not see you.”

“Take the ski mask,” Logan said, pulling one out of a drawer and tossing it to her.

She pulled it over her head, and somehow managed to avoid looking ridiculous in it.

\--

Bolivar Trask had actually no idea what to make of the screaming. The door was thick enough that normal speech only registered as vague murmurs, sound without meaning, but the shrieking almost made his heart stop. Did they have other hostages? Were they torturing them?

He scrambled backward when the door opened, admitting a woman in dark clothes and a ski mask. She held a tray that smelled mouthwatering -- he hadn’t eaten since the morning before.

“Breakfast,” she said. “If you heard all...that, there was a spider in the kitchen.”

“A _spider_?” he said, incredulous. He couldn’t stop staring at the tray.

“It was a _big_ spider,” she said, amused. She didn’t sound like a cold-blooded killer, but then, you could never tell. “Once you’ve eaten, I’ll have one of the men take you to the bathroom. We aren’t here to hurt you, but I recommend you not try to run.”

Her voice was so soothing that he wanted to believe her, but he didn’t. Couldn’t. She might only want to get his guard down. Besides, one of the group had almost shot him yesterday.

She left the tray with him, and he wondered if she’d poisoned any of it. He was so hungry that he almost didn’t care. If they wanted him as a hostage, poisoning him would be stupid, and it smelled too good to pass up.

Later, it would turn out to be a very good thing he had a full stomach.

\--

Marie was still asleep when he brought coffee back to the room, so Logan sat and made his own shopping list.

Actual LSD was way too hard to make, even if he had the ingredients and knowledge. All he really needed was some cough syrup -- in 1973, there was still all kinds of fun shit in a lot of medicines -- some orange peels, and a little Windex (or something like it).

“What’re you doin’?” Marie asked, stretching and blinking. She’d lost so much sleep from nightmares that when she’d finally truly dropped off, he hadn’t wanted to wake her until she damn well felt like it, even if she slept until noon.

“It’s a surprise. Want you to talk to the Professor about your nightmares. And don’t try to tell me you didn’t have any last night,” he added. “Drink your coffee and put on some actual clothes.”

She scowled at him, but she didn’t actually protest. Marie was stubborn, but she wasn’t any dummy. She knew she needed help, and you couldn’t find much better than the Professor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter inspired by the giant spider I found in my kitchen sink this morning.


	9. Day One, Part Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Rogue gets some help, Logan is actually a decent cook, arachnid warfare is declared, Ororo comes to some very wrong conclusions, and the plot thickens.

After the Spider Incident, there was no way in hell Kitty was going to lurk in the vent to observe Hank and Raven. It just wasn’t going to happen, no matter how much Clarice begged. 

Instead, she grabbed one of the vacuums (a huge monstrosity that had to weigh almost as much as she did) and went spider-hunting. After an hour, she had yet to find any more like that _thing_ that had been in her hair, but she wasn’t exactly reassured -- it could just mean they were better at hiding.

She almost ran headlong into Raven, who looked from her to the vacuum and back again. “Spiders?” she asked, with the tiniest hint of a smile.

Kitty sighed. “Hank told you, didn’t he?” she groaned. “To be fair, he ran like a little girl, too.”

Raven actually laughed. “He told me that, too. He said that in his defense, the spider was almost as big as you.”

Normally, Kitty hated height jokes, but in this case, she couldn’t really argue. “He’s not far off.” She paused. “Look, just what are you making in your...lab, or whatever? Hank just keeps telling us it’s a surprise and not to worry, but if crap is blowing up, of course I’m going to worry. We all are. And sooner or later the Professor’s going to find out.”

Raven looked away. “It’s something that’s supposed to explode,” she said quietly, “just not yet. I don’t think it’s something Charles would stop, because we aren’t going to hurt anyone with it. Honestly, _I_ wouldn’t mind taking out a few people, but Hank would never agree. If you know him in the future, you ought to know that.”

She had a point. Though the Beast Kitty knew in the future could fight, and fight well, at heart he was still a rather gentle person. He wouldn’t try to get anything done by being a terrorist. “I’m trusting you,” she said. “I don’t trust many people anymore, so...don’t abuse it, okay?”

Raven eyed her curiously. “You didn’t like me much in the future, did you?” she asked.

Kitty shrugged. “I didn’t know you personally,” she said, “but you were on Magneto’s side, and he _did_ try to murder my friend, as well as a whole load of other people. Now, though, in this time -- well, you’re not that different from a lot of people I know. So just...stay that way, okay? Please? It’s just...even in the future, most of my friends are dead, and I’d kind of like to make some new ones.”

To her surprise, she’d swear there were a few tears in Raven’s eyes -- just for a moment, little more than a fraction of a second, but there. “I’ll try,” she said. “It’s been a long time since I’ve had any friends, either. I’m not sure I’d be much good at it, anymore.”

“As long as you don’t try to kill my friends or throw bread at me, you’re good.” Kitty grinned. “Want to help me hunt some spiders?”

\--

Though Marie knew Logan was right, she was still nervous about letting the Professor see just what had happened to her. She would have felt unsettled even if it was his older self that she knew so well, but this younger version of him -- well, she strusted him, but she didn’t _know_ him.

“I’m stayin’ ’til you kick me out,” Logan said, sitting beside her on the couch. “You wanna stop at any time, just say so. You know the Professor won’t push.”

She nodded, but didn’t say anything, and couldn’t quite look at the Professor when he wheeled his way in, stopping in front of her. When she dared meet his eyes, she saw an echo -- or perhaps a precursor -- of the empathy so intrinsic to his older self.

“Marie, I will only see what you want me to,” he said gently. “And if you want me to stop, all you have to do is think it. I don’t know that I can be as much help as my older incarnation has been to you, but I’ll try."

Marie nodded, but again, she couldn’t bring herself to speak. This was going to be hard enough as it was.

 _She didn’t want to think about it -- any of it -- but she knew it would be better to lance the infection all at once. She dredged up the memories that she could suppress when she woke, the ones that only haunted her dreams: the cold, the pain, the never-ending terror. Metal restraints that bit into her wrists, blood and needles, the kicks delivered simply because they could be. Most of the guards feared to touch her, even with gloves, but knew that a boot was complete protection. They were never allowed to break her bones, to physically damage her in ways that would impede the scientists’ experiments, but it was perfectly possible to hurt without actually_ injuring.

_She poured it all out, only vaguely mindful of the fact that she might be overwhelming the Professor. This might be the one and only time she could ever let herself think of it, so she had to do it all at once._

When she finally came back to the present, she was appalled to find she was crying. You never cried at the camps -- it was a sign of weakness, and the guards would exploit it for all it was worth. Logan’s arm was a warm weight around her shoulders, and she leaned against him, shuddering.

She found the Professor staring at her with an expression of profound grief. His older self, she thought, must be more practiced at hiding it, because she was quite sure he would still feel it.

“I’m so sorry,” he said, his voice little more than a whisper. “I knew the future was terrible, but I didn’t -- I’m sorry.”

“Can you do anythin’ for her?” Logan asked, pulling her closer. 

“I could try to wipe it,” he said slowly, “but so much memory, so many years -- I think that would do more harm than good, in the end. Theoretically I could block the memories, but I’ve never tried such a thing before.”

Marie thought of Jean, of what the blocks on _her_ mind had created. “I’d rather you not try,” she said quietly. “In the future -- I’ve seen the results of that. It wasn’t pretty.”

The Professor was silent a moment, considering. “I can at least try to remove the horror of them,” he said at last. “The memories would remain, but they would be -- they’d be like something you’d seen in a horror film. They would be objective, not subjective, and while it might not take the nightmares away, they could diminish, and they wouldn’t seem so...clear.”

It wasn’t perfect, but it was more than she’d let herself hope. “Do it,” she said. “Please. Anythin’s better than nothin’.”

He drew a deep breath, and she thought he must be focusing himself. “You shouldn’t feel anything,” he said. “You won’t notice I’m there.”

He was right -- she had no idea what he was doing, or if he was doing anything. The memories were fading again, but they always did that when she shoved them so ruthlessly into their box within her mind. She’d probably only know if it had worked when she tried to sleep. She sat very still, trying not to fidget, until the Professor leaned back in his chair. 

“Tell me,” he said. “Tomorrow, if you’ve had more nightmares, tell me, and I’ll see if I can do anything more.”

“I will,” she said, a little unevenly. “Thank you, Professor. I mean it.”

“I mean it, too,” Logan added. “C’mon, darlin’. Let’s get you some real food.”

\--

Logan had been far more nervous than he’d let on, even to himself. He didn’t know much about the finer details of the Professor’s telepathy -- while he had a pretty good idea what it could do, he was a lot hazier on what it _couldn’t_ do. 

In a way, it was maybe better that he couldn’t just erase Marie’s memories. For years, Logan hadn’t had any conscious recollection of what Stryker had done to him, but the nightmares had come anyway -- and not knowing had actually been worse. There had been a reason he’d gone on his quest to get his memories back, even though he knew they were probably terrible. He wouldn’t inflict that on Marie -- it was far better to take the worst of the pain out of the memories than to take them away entirely.

She was still shivering a little when he led her down to the kitchen -- which was fortunately empty by now -- but she wasn’t so pale. She didn’t protest when he parked her on a kitchen chair and went to raid the fridge. There weren’t many things he could actually cook, but he was good at the few dishes he actually knew.

“Yout want to come into the village?” he asked, turning on the stove and grabbing a frying-pan. The Professor had ordered bacon, but they were probably about to eat it all. “It’d get you outta the house, and you could keep me outta trouble.”

Marie smiled at him, and while it wasn’t one of the full-blown smiles he knew so well, it was still there. “As if I could ever manage that,” she said. “I’ll try, though. How are you gonna buy anythin’ when you don’t have any money, though? You can’t steal from the Professor.”

“Not gonna,” he said, ripping into the package of bacon with his claws. He still wasn’t used to them being bone rather than metal -- they were the only sign that the body he currently inhabited really was his younger self, which brought up a whole host of worries he wasn’t going to pay any heed to at the moment -- or ever, if he could get away with it. “House like this probably has some of ’em already. When he ordered groceries, he opened a tab in the village store. I just need to add some oranges and cough syrup.”

She snorted. “I don’t even wanna know,” she said, closing her eyes and inhaling when he put the bacon on to fry.

“No,” he agreed easily, “you probably don’t. You’ll like the result, though. Think we all will.” And he really did. Oh, some of them might not _approve_ , but they’d be entertained by it anyway. And God knew Trask had it coming. “Once you’ve eaten, we’d better head out fast as we can, before anyone else jumps on the bandwagon.” He was mostly referring to Clarice. Hank and Raven were busy plotting to make something explode, Ororo was out wandering the gardens, Kitty was waging a vacuum-war with any other spiders that might be lurking around, and Magneto was doing whatever it was Magneto did when he wasn’t trying to murder someone.

“We could just go now,” Marie said, but it was halfhearted; the scent of the bacon was doing its job.

“You think I’m gonna let you out into the world without gettin’ some actual food in you? Maybe once you’ve gained ten pounds.” More like fifteen, but even he knew better than to say too much about weight to a woman.

She looked at her arms, which even in a long-sleeved shirt looked far too bony. “Sugar, you’re like a mother hen with one chick,” she said, shaking her head. “Fine. But if Clarice tries to tag along ’cause we took too long, I’m blamin’ you.”

“I think I can handle that,” he said dryly, cracking an egg. If worst came to worst, he could always tell her Marie just needed a break from the group and all the insanity that went with it. Clarice had been Marie’s friend before everything went to shit -- if something would make Marie’s life easier, she probably wouldn’t question it.

Kitty chose that moment to go barreling through the kitchen as fast as her limp would allow, hold a vacuum so tall it had to come up to her shoulder when standing. She was followed by Raven, who clutched the other end of it -- while Kitty looked terrified, Raven looked on the verge of bursting out laughing. They both phased through the door, tearing off across the lawn.

Marie blinked. “Do I wanna know?”

“With those two? Probably not.” He didn’t doubt that they’d found more spiders, but he was hardly going to tell Marie that. Clarice hadn’t been kidding, when she said Marie might not sleep again if she knew. 

So. It looked like Kitty was making friends with Raven. The thought was weird, but not half so weird as most of the shit that had happened in the last two days. Part of him thought that maybe Marie could use a new friend, too, but most of him thought that letting _Mystique_ be that friend would be a spectacularly bad idea. Older Mystique had, after all, been the one to trick her into leaving the school, allowing Magneto to catch her and almost kill her. 

Marie was also somewhat more sensitive than Kitty. Both were very strong women, but Kitty had the subtlety of a brick, and the mental fortitude of one, too. You could chase her for a week, insulting her the entire time, and she wouldn’t give two shits, but Marie’s life had been much more difficult, and had marked her accordingly. She might not say anything, but she took things to heart -- and Logan could see when she was hurting inside, even if she managed to hide it from everyone else. Which she usually did.

No, he’d leave Kitty to deal with Raven, and not say a thing to Marie. He’d suggest Hank for a buddy, but Hank was so stupidly infatuated with Raven that that might do more harm than good. At least Marie had everyone from her own time to support her.

For all she’d suggested leaving before she had breakfast, she practically inhaled both eggs and all the bacon. She washed it down with a cup of what she called his kamikaze coffee: so thick that you could practically stand a spoon up in it.

He left the dishes for someone else to clean up -- if Hank didn’t take care of it, Ororo would -- and the pair of them went out into the sunshine. He offered her his hand, knowing just what the small gesture would mean to her. Nobody, not even her friends, would be comfortable with that kind of contact, even with her gloves.

This time, the smile she gave him was one of her full-on Marie smiles, so unlike anything else he’d ever seen. Really, he thought, it was a little disgusting how goddamn gooey he could get when dealing with her, but fuck it. He wasn’t going to draw away because of macho bullshit.

Across the lawn, Kitty and Raven had almost entirely disassembled the vacuum -- the Professor was going to _love_ that -- while Ororo watched from beneath a tree, shaking her head. Both women were absolutely covered in dust and lint, but at least there were no spiders to be seen. He hoped they could hold off blowing anything else up before he and Marie got home, and only partly because he wanted to watch if they did.

\--

While the arrival of Kitty and Raven had disturbed Ororo’s tranquility, she couldn’t exactly say she minded. Watching Kitty’s frantic scrambling and Raven’s barely-controlled amusement was more entertaining than anything she’d seen in a while. There was nothing malicious in Raven’s silent laughter -- she wasn’t mocking Kitty. She was merely having fun, something Ororo suspected had not figured in her life for quite a long while. There was an innate sadness to the woman, as well as a bubbling anger that simmered just below the surface of her skin. She had, after all, been planning to murder Trask in cold blood.

It wasn’t there now, though. How old was she? It was difficult to tell. She could be anywhere from twenty-five to thirty-five, but the mirth in her eyes made Ororo lean more toward the former number than the latter. All too often, the world could age a person’s mind far more quickly than their body.

Kitty sneezed, trying to wipe her face with the tail of her shirt -- it did nothing but smear the dust around, to her obvious irritation. Fortunately, that meant she didn’t notice the spider that went shooting out of the vacuum bag and into the lawn.

Raven saw it, and for a second she met Ororo’s eyes. Both women grinned, but said nothing.

“Do I even want to ask?” Magneto had stepped out the kitchen door, and was eyeing the scene before him with very obvious distrust. Ororo didn’t miss the fact that _both_ women glowered at him.

“Spider-hunting,” Kitty said, as though it were completely obvious. “Caught a few more of the little fuckers, too. Professor really needs to hire an exterminator, or I’m sleeping in the van.”

“What a hardship _that_ would be for the rest of us,” he said dryly, and made the very grave mistake of stepping out onto the grass.

Kitty’s eyes narrowed. Ororo had no idea what he’d done, to annoy her so much more than the rest of them, but it must have been quite obnoxious. Her next actions took mere moments -- she glanced down at the vacuum bag, grabbed it with an absolutely evil grin, and flung it at him.

Of course he deflected it with his arm, and rather easily at that, but he couldn’t deflect the dust -- or the golf-ball-sized spider that landed on his face.

What happened next would make Ororo laugh every time she thought of it for the next ten years. Normally he was self-possessed almost to a fault, but apparently even he had limits, and arachnid warfare was one of them. He flailed -- actually _flailed_ \-- trying to flick the spider off his face. Unfortunately for him, it crawled down his neck before he could react, headed for the collar of his shirt.

Raven choked back a laugh, but Kitty didn’t even bother trying. She all but collapsed onto the grass, cackling like lunatic, laughing so hard her breath started hitching. Ororo herself had a very hard time keeping a straight face, but she managed it. Mostly.

Fortunately for Magneto, he actually managed to catch the spider before it made its way down his shirt -- catch it, not fling it. His expression went absolutely murderous.

“Oh, really,” he snapped. “Oh _really_. I wouldn’t want to deprive you of your little eight-legged friend.”

Kitty realized what he was doing before he actually reached her, and she swore, frantically trying to get back to her feet. Her injured leg didn’t make that easy. “Fuck -- no, dude. Just _no._ Raven, help!”

Unfortunately for Kitty, Raven didn’t get a chance. The spider -- poor thing, it was probably so confused -- went flying, scoring a direct hit in Kitty’s hair.

“You _fucker!_ ” she screamed, clawing at her hair. “You absolute fucker!” Incredibly, she actually grabbed the spider, though Ororo suspected that this time, when she threw it back at him, it was pure instinct.

He tried to dodge, but by some absolute freak of propability, it landed on his chest. He staggered, and actually shuddered, but this time he brushed it off his shirt -- and ran. _Ran._

By this point, Raven had given up trying to contain her laughter. She joined Ororo under the tree, watching Kitty try to limp her way away from the general vicinity of that poor, poor spider. Had she been in any condition to do so, Ororo had no doubt she would have picked up that vacuum and tried to brain Magneto with it.

“Just you wait,” she growled. “I know where you sleep. And I have worse weapons that croutons.”

“Where exactly did the crouton thing start?” Ororo asked Raven. 

“I have no idea. At first I thought it was code for something, but no, they really do just throw croutons at each other. I’d complain about how immature it is, but it’s too much fun to watch.”

Ororo had her own thoughts on the matter, though she’d keep them to herself for now. Had either party known just what kind of wrong conclusions she was drawing, they would have been horrified, and possibly have formed a temporary alliance to bring the crouton war to a new party, but for now they remained both blissfully ignorant and viciously angry. Fortunately for everyone.

\--

The village, Marie found, was the kind of small, quaint place that hadn’t existed even when she’d been younger. Even the newest of the buildings looked almost thirty years old -- probably built after World War II. The older ones, especially the houses, might well be ancient as far as she was concerned. Some were wood, some stone, but almost all of them had very old-fashioned leaded windows. It looked like a movie set.

By the time they reached town, it was quite warm, and she was sweltering even in her light shirt. The owner of the village store (surprisingly large, given the size of the town) gave her a free bottle of wonderfully cold lemonade.

Since they were the only two customers in the shop, she made small talk with the owner while Logan browsed, thankful her French had held up even after having been unused for so long.

“You are too thin,” the owner said, a little disparagingly. “Does he not feed you?”

After the breakfast she’d had, it was all she could do not to laugh. “I was sick for a long time, recently,” she said, and it was only half a lie. The only time the camp’s scientists had cared about any illnesses was when they interefered with the tests. “Very sick. He tries to feed me too much.”

“As he should,” the shopkeeper said, but he seemd to be mollified a little. “Are you at the big house?”

“For now,” she said, trying not to sound evasive. “We’re staying with a friend. He thought I might recover better in the fresh air.” As excuses went, it wasn’t a bad one, and flattering the guy’s town could only go over well. She had no doubt it would get around town before the end of the day, so that anyone who might wonder about the sudden occupation of “the Big House” would have their curiosity satisfied. “He ordered a lot of groceries yesterday, but I wanted a few more things, and figured a walk might do me some good.” When, exactly, had she become so adept at lying? She wasn’t sure, and she also wasn’t certain she liked how easily it came to her -- no matter how handy it might be.

At least her excuse explained the big bottle of cough syrup Logan brought to the counter -- it wasn’t just big, it was outright _enormous_ , easily enough for a decent-sized family. The sheer number of oranges also made sense, though the blue bottle of window-cleaner was a little out-of-place. Yet again, she wondered just what in the name of hell he was up to.

“These go on the mansion’s tab,” he said. “Marie, you need to rest longer?” he asked, thankfully still speaking in French. While she knew neither of them could pass for native speakers, it might be easier if the owner actually understood all of what they were saying. _Why_ it would be easier, she didn’t know, but she trusted her instincts.

“Another minute,” she said. “Hotter out there than I thought it would be.”

The owner plunked another bottle of lemonade in front of her. “You drink that, and you rest. My daughter, she had typhus two years ago. You can’t go exerting yourself too much too soon. Keep her eating, even if she doesn’t want to,” he added to Logan, who was openly amused.

“Workin’ on it,” he said. “She told me I’m a mother hen.”

“Well, you _are_ ,” she said, with a small grin. “You’re lucky I don’t mind.”

“Do some cookin’ when we get back,” he said, and she had a feeling he wasn’t talking about food. The fact that whatever he wanted to make would need cooking was...well, a little alarming.

“I can’t wait.” She didn’t bother to keep the sarcasm out of her voice, though the rest of her reply died when she spotted the newspaper stand.

The kidnappers’ van -- the _other_ kidnappers’ -- was splashed across the front page. It looked even more banged-up than they’d left it when they fled.

 _Terrorist Cell Uncovered_ the headline read, and beneath it, smaller, _Dignitary Still Missing._

She hopped off her stool and picked up the paper, scanning it. Beneath the photo of the van there was a small picture of Trask, who appeared to be scowling at the camera. “Can we put this on the tab, too?” she asked.

“Of course. Terrible business,” the owner said. “Of course, what else can you expect in a city? If it wasn’t for the kidnapping, I would think the entire thing is a hoax.”

Well, that was...unsettling. She thanked the man, and she and Logan left, him hauling their grocerie bags with one hand while she read the newspaper, trusting him to keep her from walking into anything while she read.

What she read was downright scary. She actually went over the article twice, hoping for proof that she was wrong, that she’d just had a difficult time reading French, but no -- her translation was, unfortunately, quite accurate. She actually came to a dead stop, trying not to panic.

“What?” Logan grunted, pausing as well. When he saw her wide eyes, his expression softened. “Marie, what is it?”

She looked up at him, somewhat aghast. “Sugar, I don’t think we’re the only time travelers here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dun dun DUN. I said the ninja wannabes would be back, didn’t I? Well, they might not be here in person yet, but their backstory will shortly be explained.


	10. Revelations, Drugs, and Drunken Cooking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Trask is drugged, Kitty and Clarice get hammered, more wrong conclusions are made, and Marie and Logan get some answers they don't like.

Since Kitty was completely unwilling to spy on Hank and his lab, Clarice had taken it upon herself to do it. For the greater good, of course.

Portaling into the air duct wasn’t easy -- she’d done it pretty far down, to avoid detection, which meant she had to do quite a bit of crawling to reach the grate looking down on the room. She wound up dusty as hell, and spent half an hour suppressing a sneeze.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t much to see. Raven left fairly early on, and Hank just puttered around with weird liquids. It continued to stink like rotten eggs, but nothing exploded, or even caught on fire. Eventually, bored, she gave up, and portaled herself out into the kitchen.

She found the sink full of dishes, assumed they were Logan’s, and sighed. She was an almost pathologically tidy creature, so she put them on to soak and went to dig through the Professor’s liquor cabinet.

It was a huge thing, and it looked like nobody else had broken into it yet. It had been years since Clarice had had a real drink -- even if alcohol had been available in the future, she wouldn’t have dared do anything that might dull her senses. Sure, it was only one in the afternoon, but it was beer o’clock somewhere. Bourbon o’clock. Whatever.

None of it was labeled, which meant it was all probably expensive as hell, and ought to be savored by people who actually knew how to do that. Clarice, being a total plebe, just started knocking back shots in between scrubbing pans and plates covered in dried fried egg remains. Would it have killed anyone to use some damn butter?

She was half done with both dishes and bottle when Kitty scampered in, hopped up on the counter, and started rummaging through the cupboard. “Are there any Tupperware kind of things in here?” she asked.

“Try the cupboard next to the fridge,” Clarice said, chiseling at a particularly stubborn bit of egg with a butter knife. “Why?”

“I have plans,” Kitty said darkly. “I need something to hold the spiders.”

Clarice paused, and turned to look at her. “I don’t know if I want to ask why, but I’m going to anyway,” she said.

Kitty scooted across the counter and started digging through the next cupboard. “Let’s just say crouton warfare has escalated. Retribution must be had.”

Shaking her head, Clarice said, “You’re going to get yourself murdered before the weekend’s over. You know that, right?”

“Only if I get caught,” Kitty growled. “I can run through walls. As long as I don’t wear any metal jewelry, I’m golden.”

“Why don’t you have a drink instead?” Clarice shoved the bottle down the length of the counter. “It’s good stuff, and probably more fun than catching spiders.”

Kitty, who had piled a worrying number of plastic containers around her, grabbed the bottle and sniffed. The fumes made her recoil a little. “How about I have some of this and we _both_ go spider hunting? It’s for a worthy cause.”

“Your war isn’t my war,” Clarice said firmly, grabbing a glass. “Don’t chug this stuff. It probably cost more than that van we stole.”

“That’s not exactly saying much,” Kitty said, pouring probably more than she ought to. “And why _isn’t_ my war your war? Come on, I’m doing everyone a favor keeping him so constantly pissed off. He’s probably not planning anybody’s murder but mine, and I can handle that.”

 _Yeah, right up until you can’t_ , Clarice thought, attacking the dishes once more. Well, no, Magneto probably wouldn’t actually _kill_ her, since the Professor would go medieval on his brain if he did, but still. When it came to psychological warfare, Clarice highly doubted Kitty could win against goddamn Magneto. Honestly, she was starting to wonder about those two, and was reaching some conclusions that sort of creeped her out.

“Your funeral,” she said aloud, taking another sip of her own drink. You had to sip this stuff -- anything more and you’d choke. “Anyway, I thought you were scared of spiders.”

“I am,” Kitty said, unwisely taking a full swig. Her eyes widened, and she coughed so violently she fell off the counter. “ _Jesus_ , this stuff is supposed to be expensive? It’s like paint thinner!” She wheezed a little more, and shuddered, but that didn’t stop her from taking another, more cautious sip. “And I am, but so is he. And you bet your ass I’m going to use that.”

It occurred to Clarice that this exercise in insanity might just be Kitty’s way of dealing with being hurled so unexpectedly into the past. Certainly, in the future she was nowhere near this vicious, unless she was dealing with a Sentinel. Baiting Hank would be like kicking a puppy, and of course the Professor was the Professor, no matter how 70’s his hair looked, but tormenting Magneto was like poking a tiger with a stick. Clarice really didn’t want to be around when the tiger snapped back with something worse than a spider.

“Fine,” she sighed. “But you have to help me finish these dishes first.”

“Square deal. Who the hell cooked last? Logan?”

\--

Marie seemed incapable of answering Logan’s dozens of questions -- she just handed him the newspaper, shivering a little.

The press of the 1970’s was a very different animal than it had been immediately before the world went to hell in the future, and not just because it tried to blame everything on the Communists. It freely speculated about the fail-ninjas and the strange equipment they’d been carrying -- the inner pages contained grainy photos of what looked very much like a modern cell phone, as well as a few other gadgets that seemed too advanced to be even from their future.

The criminals, they said, spoke extremely convoluted French, peppered with unknown colloquialisms that were assumed to be used as some kind of Soviet code. The worst part, the bit that had surely been what freaked out Marie so much, was the fact that one of them kept babbling about Sentinel War Two.

There wasn’t much else -- at least, not much of any use. The article said they were being “held for questioning”, but of course it didn’t mention _where_. The papers might like to blab, but they weren’t going to give everything.

“Motherfucker,” he muttered. “We’ve gotta tell the Professor. Trask isn’t our biggest problem anymore.” He paused. “Still wanna give the little shit acid, though.”

Marie burst out laughing, the tension visibly draining from her. “Can’t blame you, sugar, but if we’ve gotta release him soon, I don’t know if that’s a great idea.”

“Sure it is,” he said, handing the paper back to her and picking up the grocery bag. “If he’s trippin’ balls when we shove him out somewhere, he won’t be able to describe anythin’ useful until it’s too late for him to remember.”

“If you say it like that to the Professor, he just might go for it,” she said. “It’s just -- Sentinel War Two? Have we somehow gone and made it worse since we got here?”

“Doubt it,” he grunted. “It’s only been two days. They mighta been back here even before we were. What I’m wonderin’ is if maybe them comin’ here’s what dragged all of you. Some kinda -- what’s the term? Ripple effect?”

“If that’s the case, how come it’s just been us women so far?” Marie asked, fanning herself with the newspaper.

“For all we know, it’s not.” Which, if all the men were back here too, was even more unsettling to him personally -- if that was the case, who the hell was guarding his body? Was it even alive in the future anymore? “For now, we need to work on gettin’ those idiots outta prison. Once we figure out where they’re bein’ held.”

Marie was quiet a moment. “You think we oughtta actually tell everyone about this?” she asked. “I mean, the Professor, sure, but anybody else? If Raven or Magneto found out, they might try to do somethin’ stupid, and everybody else...well, they’d wanna help, but you know well _that_ would probably end.”

He did. He could picture it with unfortunate clarity. “Just the Professor,” he said. “Rip out the important parts and chuck the rest of the paper, will you? I can stuff what’s left in my pocket.”

“How’re you gonna explain the groceries?” she asked, trying to keep all the text intact as she ripped.

“I’m not. Gonna hide ’em in the garden until everyone’s gone to bed. We’ll talk to the Professor after dinner, plan...whatever, and then I’ll cook this shit up. Won’t dose Trask until we’re ready to set him loose.”

“That doesn’t mean somebody else won’t have done somethin’ first,” Marie pointed out. “I mean, Magneto and Raven would be the most likely, but I wouldn’t put anythin’ past Kitty and Clarice, either. First time they’ve had time on their hands since before the Sentinels, right?”

Logan hadn’t even thought of that. Trying to figure out what Hank was doing probably wouldn’t distract them for very long. He hoped like hell that Ororo had better sense than him, and hadn’t left them alone for long.

Unfortunately, he was wrong. So very, very wrong.

\--

Long before Logan and Rogue came back into the house, Kitty and Clarice were truly, gloriously crocked. They’d cleaned up the kitchen, and immediately made it filthy again fixing lunch for Trask. Fortunately for him, Clarice could have produced a gourmet meal even if she was half-dead.

It was Kitty, naturally, who suggested spiking it with something -- in addition to giving him a plastic cup full of the Professor’s expensive whiskey. Accordingly, she’d left the drinks to Clarice, and scurried off to the main bathroom for some of the painkillers she’d had so much fun with the night before.

She almost slammed right into Magneto on her way, and his expression sent her into a fit of cackling laughter. “Don’t worry,” she said. “You’re not my target right now.”

“Somehow,” he said, a little imperiously, “I don’t find that terribly reassuring.”

“You shouldn’t. Get out of my way.”

Fortunately for him, he did, and she rifled through the medicine cabinet with a glee that was almost obscene. While she couldn’t read French, she knew what Hank had given her the night before. She’d have to be damn careful with the dose -- not only was Trask a little person, Clarice was giving him booze. They couldn’t afford to poison him, no matter how much they’d probably all like to.

So she took a single pill out of the bottle Hank had given her the night before, and carefully broke off a quarter of it. She kept the rest of it for herself, because she knew that once the alcohol wore off, her leg and head were going to hurt like a bitch again.

“What, exactly, are you doing?”

Kitty jumped, and almost screamed. She turned to glare at Magneto, who had stuck his head in the door. “Don’t _do_ that,” she said. “And for your information, Clarice and I just made Trask lunch. It’s just missing an ingredient.” She held up the tiny chunk of pill, gesturing with her other hand like a tiny drunken Vanna White.

To her great surprise, he laughed, in an understated way that was frankly rather creepy. “I see. I suppose you’ll need a guard, to make sure he doesn’t try to run when you open the door?”

“Sure, why not?” That honestly hadn’t even occurred to her, though she knew that either she or Clarice alone could have taken him down without breaking a sweat. At least, unlike her, he was no longer covered in vacuum dust: even if she put on the ski mask, she looked a little bit like a walking dustbunny. “Just don’t talk, or he’ll know you’re the one who tried to shoot him. He might not eat if he knows it’s you, and that’d ruin the whole thing.”

He didn’t agree, but he didn’t _disagree_ either, which was probably the best she could hope for. In fact, miraculously, he actually kept his trap shut all the way to the kitchen -- which Kitty, even drunk as she was, found rather ominous.

Clarice had someone managed to kill the rest of the bottle by the time they got back to the kitchen, and cracked open another. She raised her glass to Kitty, and shoved the tray with Trask’s lunch on it toward her. 

It smelled amazing. She’d knocked together something that had started as beef stew, but had wound up something damn near an art form, with potatoes and herbs and who knew what else. The important thing was that it would mask any bitterness the pill might add.

Kitty pulled a butter knife out of the drawer, and used it to very carefully pulverize the pill into a fine dust in her palm. She sprinkled the dust over the stew, and stirred it up enough to dissolve it. “Let’s do this.”

Magneto looked from one to the other, and then to the tray. Clarice had made toast as well, and added a glass of ice water alongside the large cup of whiskey. He must have thought it was as ridiculous as it looked, because he rolled his eyes. “Ski masks,” he said. “I can’t believe you’re giving him food like this.”

“Shhh,” Clarice said, and burst into a fit of giggling. “Go, guys. Feed the prisoner.” She herself dove under the kitchen table, hiding amid the chairs.

Something about the sight struck Kitty as hysterically funny, but she choked back her laughter, schooling her expression into something approaching sober before she pulled on her mask. She didn’t dare look at Magneto, or she’d lose it all over again.

“Lunch,” she said, after he’d opened the door.

Trask scowled at her, but there was still uncertainty behind his eyes. She could tell he was calculating, wondering if it would be worth it to try to rush her. Fortunately, he decided against it, and she set the tray down with a small flourish. He might not know they were mutants, but she wondered just what the hell he must think of them, this insane group of kidnappers who screamed about spiders and cooked him gourmet meals.

“Are you really planning to let me go?” he asked, eyeing her as though he expected a sneak attack any second.

“In a couple days, yeah,” Kitty said, praying Magneto wouldn’t open his fool mouth. “Once it’s safe.”

“You’re American,” he said, and she could practically see the wheels turning in his head.

“ _Duh_ ,” she muttered. “You have a multinational coalition of kidnappers. You should feel special. Now eat up.”

They left before he could respond, securely bolting the door. As soon as she’d moved far enough away, she collapsed into a fit of almost hysterical laughter. Clarice, who had just got hold of herself, immediately followed suit. Magneto just rolled his eyes again, and reached for the booze.

“Can I trust you enough to make the rest of us food?” he asked, when they’d finally calmed down again.

“Of course you can,” Clarice said, visibly offended. “I’m drunk, not stupid. _Her_ , on the other hand...”

“Shut your pie-hole,” Kitty retorted. “I can still peel potatoes.”

“Try not to bleed on them when you cut your finger off,” Magneto said helpfully.

“I’m starting to wonder if you like having spiders thrown at you,” she snapped, and couldn’t quite mask her vicious glee when he twitched.

Logan, who somehow had the ability to creep like a cat even while stomping, yanked the sliding-glass door open and stalked into the kitchen. “Who’s throwin’ spiders?”

“Crouton warfare has escalated,” Clarice informed him. Any further words were lost in a wave of giggling.

Logan took in the kitchen -- the counters were piled high with cooking pots and pans, one area holding potato peels and assorted herbs. It also held two extremely drunk women, and a Magneto who looked like he’d swallowed half a lemon. “Not gonna ask,” he muttered. “You two do anythin’ especially stupid while Marie and I were out?”

“Not _especially_ , no,” Magneto said, before either could launch into a rambling account of their activities. “Still quite stupid, though. Trask’s been drugged, and spiders have indeed been thrown.” Even through the haze of alcohol, Kitty could recognize his inflection -- it promised revenge later, and she figured it would be smart to find another room, lest she wake up surrounded by the things.

“Spiders?” Rogue asked, unfortunately coming through the door at exactly the wrong moment. “What’s this about spiders?”

“Nothin’,” Logan hedged. “Just these two actin’ like ten-year-olds.”

Kitty briefly considered being outraged by that, but realized that she didn’t have a leg to stand on. Her only comfort was that she really hadn’t started the whole mess. 

“I don’t wanna ask,” Rogue said. “I really, really don’t. Where’s the Professor?”

“In his room, making some calls,” Magneto said. “I wouldn’t tell him about this. Not yet, anyway.”

“I’ll let you explain it yourselves,” Logan snorted. “C’mon, Marie. Doubt any spiders would go near the Professor.”

Rogue shuddered. “I hope you’re right.”

\--

Marie really was quite freaked out by the thought of spiders in the house. Having grown up in Mississippi, a state stuffed with dozens of different types of spiders, she’d developed a terror of the things quite early in her life. Small spiders wouldn’t make very effective weapons, so she couldn’t help but picture the kind of monstrosity Kitty and Magneto must have found. Considering Kitty was almost as afraid of them as Marie herself, she could only wonder just what Magneto had done now that was bad enough to make Kitty willing to actually throw them at him.

She kept a watchful eye out as they traversed the hallways to the Professor’s room -- Logan only knew where it was because he could track the Professor’s scent -- half-expecting to see a giant web stretched across their path. While she sensed Logan’s faint amusement, he was smart enough not to say anything.

The room the Professor had taken might well have been his when he was a boy. The walls were lined with dark wooden bookshelves stuffed with books, and there were several model airplanes hanging on strings from the ceiling. The windows were very large, looking out over the yard and the green fields beyond.

He sat in front of the window now, telephone at his ear, looking rather harassed. Under any other circumstances, Marie would have left him to it and come back later, but this couldn’t wait.

She glanced at Logan, who pulled the pieces of newspaper out of his pocket and held the biggest one up -- it was the picture on the front page, with the little one of Trask beneath it.

The Professor’s eyes widened, and he hung up abruptly. “It made the news,” he said, and he almost sounded helpless. “God _damn_ it.”

There was something wrong -- so very _wrong_ \-- about hearing the Professor swear, no matter how young he was. “Wait, did you already know about this?” Logan demanded, incredulous. “ _How?_ ”

The Professor sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “In the future, I’ve never told you what my father did?”

They both shook their heads.

“His official position was ‘cabinet investigator’. He died when I was very young, and I didn’t find out until I was at University just what he’d actually done -- mind you, I wasn’t supposed to. Telepathy uncovers a lot of things by accident. He wasn’t anything like James Bond, but he was, essentially, a spy. He had quite a few contacts, and some of them are still active. I haven’t found out much, but I don’t like what I have discovered.”

“They really are from the future, aren’t they?” Marie asked.

“They are.” The Professor sighed. “Of course, right now almost no one actually believes that -- most of those I talked to think it’s some sort of elaborate Soviet code -- but one isn’t so sure. He said their technology is far too advanced to be anything out of Russia -- or anywhere, for that matter.”

“Newspaper said they were talkin’ about Sentinel War Two,” Marie said. “Just how far from the future do you think they are?”

“I don’t know. Far enough for their language to have evolved almost beyond comprehensibility. Evidently they too realized Trask was the starting point.”

“So what do we do?” Marie asked. They had to do _something._

“I need to find out where they’re being held. Once we know, we can release Trask somewhere far away, and go rescue the prisoners. If they really are from some distance into the future, it would explain why they were so very inept.”

“You know,” Marie said, thoughtful, “maybe they’re why some many more of us came back than were supposed to. Maybe they already changed the future before we got here.”

“I hate time travel,” Logan grumbled. “Makes sense. Professor, you really wanna take all these yahoos with us?”

He smiled, slightly lopsided and very dry. “If they’re with us, at least I know where they are, and what they’re doing.”

“Good point. Fine. As if things weren’t shitty enough already.”

Marie winced. “Don’t say that, sugar, it’s temptin’ fate. Things can always get worse.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rogue is very right. Things can, in fact, always get worse, and by the end of the weekend, they’re going to.


	11. Memories, Mystery, and Mayhem

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Charles discovers some things in Rogue’s memory, Ororo and Raven bond, disaster is narrowly averted, and there is, fortunately for everyone, a temporary lack of both croutons and spiders.

Amazingly, Kitty and Clarice managed to shut up to listen at the pantry, one on either side, ears pressed against the door.

Erik, who had been conned into a glass of (truly excellent) port, just shook his head. When Hank -- stinking like sulfur and some other chemical Erik didn’t want to speculate about -- came in, he stopped dead, his befuddled expression truly priceless.

“What--?” he asked, gesturing at everything and nothing. The kitchen was an even worse disaster, thanks to Clarice’s preparation of dinner -- more stew, this time not drugged, as well as corn and some kind of dumpling that smelled unfairly delicious. 

“Trask was given a special lunch,” Erik explained, sipping his drink. “They’re waiting for the effects to show.”

Hank groaned. “Special?” he asked. “Please tell me they didn’t give him acid.”

“Just opiates and bourbon,” Erik said, as if that was supposed to be reassuring. “Hopefully not enough to make him sick -- just high.”

Hank groaned again, pressing his hands to his temples. Before he could say anything, Kitty choked, pressed a finger to her lips, and frantically gestured to both of them to come closer.

It was difficult to hear, through the heaviness of the door, but Trask was actually singing. He had a surprisingly rich voice, that would have sounded quite pleasant if he’d been even close to in key.

“Incense and peppermints and strawberry wiiiiiiine!”

Clarice slapped her hand over her mouth, trying and failing to stifle her giggles. She scrambled away from the door before he could actually hear her, backing all the way across the kitchen to the counters before bursting out laughing. Hank rubbed his temples, looking pained, but Erik had to actually work to stifle his own laughter.

“Incense and peppermints the color of tiiiiime!”

Kitty gave up, crawling to join Clarice before she could give her presence away.

“Sha laaaaa la -- ow! Fuck you, fork.”

Now it was Hank who choked. He was still making a valiant effort to maintain his disapproval, but he was failing. Badly.

“Show me the way to go hooome. I’m tired and -- _what the hell is that?!_ ”

There was no artifice in his tone -- he wasn’t trying to trick them into opening the door so he could escape. There was real terror there. At a guess, Erik thought Trask must have discovered one of the mansion’s eight-legged residents -- or it had found him.

“The fuck?” Kitty asked, creeping -- limping -- forward. “What was --”

Something very heavy crashed -- given how little was in the pantry, Trask had probably tipped one of the massive shelves over. “I think the spiders have arrived,” Erik said dryly.

“Should we check on him?” Hank asked, uncertain. “Are there poisonous spiders in France?”

“Nothing fatal,” Erik replied. “He’d get a big welt, but nothing worse.”

Another crash, and an amazingly high-pitched shriek. Clarice cringed. “Should we go in there?”

“Why?” Erik asked, derisive. “Unless he knocks one of the shelves over on top of him, he’s fine.”

No sooner had he spoken than there came another crash, this one much louder, that made even him twitch a little. It was followed by a rather horrible groan, and a stream of unintelligible cursing.

“You were saying?” Clarice said. “Hank, get the masks, will you? We probably ought to make sure he hadn’t broken his neck or something.”

“Do we have to?” Kitty muttered. She stood, winced, and tried to stretch her back. Something gave out a disturbingly loud crack.

“What the hell was that?” Clarice asked.

“I don’t know, but it sounded just a little wrong.” She fished the remaining three-quarters of the pain pill out of her pocket, swallowed it dry, and gagged. “Ugh, that’s disgusting. Do we really have to check on that asshole?”

“Yes,” Clarice said firmly, “we do.” She yanked a ski mask over her head, threw one each at Magneto, Hank, and Kitty, and bravely grabbed the last clean pot. “Okay,” she said, with dead solemnity, “I’m going in.”

Hank opened the door after just the slightest of hesitations. Clarice, hat on head and pan in hand, barreled in, ready to rescue Trask from any arachnid menace.

She paused after a few steps. “Huh?”

It was with a deep sinking feeling that Erik peered around her. The shelves were a disaster -- just how Trask could have overturned them, he had no idea -- but there was a distinct lack of spiders.

There was also a lack of Trask.

“Well, shit,” Kitty said.

\--

Ororo heard the commotion in the kitchen, but had zero desire to go and investigate. Instead she lurked on the roof, hidden behind a frankly ridiculous gargoyle, and watched Raven.

The woman seemed to consciously separate herself from the rest of the group. Granted, with _this_ group, Ororo couldn’t exactly blame her, but she had the air of a lone wolf about her anyway.

The name Raven sounded very familiar, but Ororo couldn’t recall actually meeting anyone called Raven. Of course, the woman would be much older in the future, but still...something was nagging at the back of her mind, and she didn’t like it.

Logan and Rogue had been in the Professor’s room for quite a long while, too, and while she didn’t snoop, she wanted to. She didn’t doubt that they’d tell her if it was anything really important -- she wasn’t a walking disaster area like half the rest of the group.

She paused a moment, considering. “Raven,” she called softly, hopping off the roof and floating herself down to the lawn. “The Professor knows something, I think,” she said. “So do Logan and Rogue. Have they said anything to you?”

A fleeting trace of bitterness crossed Raven’s face. “No,” she said. “Charles probably won’t tell me anything. He doesn’t trust me.”

Ororo cocked her head to one side. “That can’t be entirely true,” she said. “You’re here, aren’t you?”

“So’s Magneto,” Raven snorted. “If he and I are here, it’s only because Charles would rather know where we are than have us wandering around out of sight.”

“If you know Charles Xavier at all, you’ll know that’s not true,” Ororo said gently. “If you’re here, it’s because he wants you to be. Magneto was his friend, once -- and is again, fifty years from now. If he, Rogue, and Logan know something, they’ll tell us. But they might need some...prodding.”

Raven’s eyebrows went up. “Prodding?” she said.

“Rogue will clam up if she knows what we’re up to, and stay that way, but Logan can only keep a secret until he’s pushed too far. Now, you and I are probably less adept at annoying people than some of the others, but that doesn’t mean we can’t do it. There’s no point in being subtle,” she added. “He can smell our intent. He’d know exactly what we were doing.”

To her very great surprise, Raven’s face flushed absolutely scarlet. “He can _do_ that?” she asked, appalled. “How?”

Now it was Ororo’s eyebrows that went up. “Feral senses,” she said. “They’re part of his mutation. If it makes you feel any better, he doesn’t care enough about most of the world to want to do anything with what he discovers. Unless it’s something dangerous, but judging by your expression, that’s not what you’re worried about.”

“No, it’s not,” Raven said, almost primly. “We can’t approach them at dinner, with everyone else there. If and when Charles wants to let them in on it -- that’s his choice.”

 _Well, Ororo thought, that’s a start._ No matter what Raven said, no matter what her past relationship with the Professor, she still trusted him, whether she wanted to admit it or not. “Speaking of everyone else, we should probably go see just what’s gone wrong in the kitchen now.” 

Raven grimaced. “Do we have to?”

Ororo laughed. “I think it might be best.”

The crossed the lawn, dimmer now that the sun had dipped behind the ornamental trees. The kitchen, they found, had gone worryingly quiet. What was worse, the door to Trask’s makeshift cell was open.

She would never be ashamed to admit that, for a moment, she completely panicked. There was no way they would have let him out, and his chances of escaping were pretty damn slim, but the fact remained that he was quite conspicuously absent.

Kitty, carrying a large flashlight and an even larger needle, came limping into the kitchen. Even through her jeans, Ororo could see that her left knee had swelled up like a balloon -- she probably needed an actual doctor, but that wasn’t going to happen any time soon. “Oh, good, you’re here,” she said. “Do either of you know where the Professor or Logan are? Because we have a problem.”

“I think it’s safe to say that’s an understatement,” Ororo said, somehow managing to keep the bulk of her sarcasm out of her voice. “What happened?”

“Trask freaked out over a spider or something, tipped over a bunch of shelves in the pantry, and disappeared. Turns out there was a trapdoor under one of them that goes into a basement. Clarice, Magneto, and Hank are down there looking for him, but it’s a _big_ basement. Hank doesn’t have his senses when he’s on that serum, so they’re basically just wandering around with flashlights. I’m up here to grab Trask if he somehow makes it back up without them noticing.”

Privately, Ororo wondered just how much use Kitty would be, should that happen. Oh, she was an extremely well-trained fighter, and under normal circumstances could take Trask down one-handed, but she could barely walk, and her speech was just slightly slurred -- if she wasn’t on some kind of painkiller, Ororo would be very surprised. She would never have taken one after this...mess...happened; it had to be the lingering effects of something she’d had earlier.

“I’ll see if I can find one or the other. Raven, can you stay with Kitty?” Raven was perceptive enough to know why, without Ororo having to spell it out.

“Sure.” She looked down at Kitty’s leg. “What happened to your knee?”

\--

Clarice was, by nature, a woman with a rather sunny disposition. She wasn’t fazed by much, which had to be partly why she was still alive in the future. Now, however, she was ready to murder someone. Preferably Trask.

Had the little asshole been anywhere within range, Magneto surely could have found him by either the buttons on his jacket, or the zipper on his suit. The fact that that hadn’t worked was...unsettling. It meant the basement was far bigger than she would have expected even of a place this size.

That left her, Magneto, and Hank to search the entire goddamn thing, armed with big flashlights that probably belonged to the caretakers. If the basement had ever had overhead lighting, it didn’t now: everything was so black that she half fancied she could feel the darkness pressing on her like a solid thing. It was also, though this was far less surprising, _really_ goddamn cold.

She didn’t dare use her powers to try to locate him. Doing so would render the entire exercise completely pointless -- no matter what happened, Trask couldn’t find out they were mutants. And while he might be drunk and high, they hadn’t given him anything that could let a display of mutant powers be written off as hallucination. 

Kitty hadn’t argued, when Clarice assigned her guard-duty in the kitchen, which was testament to just how fucked-up her knee was. It probably helped that it was hardly a useless job -- if Trask did get out before they caught him, somebody would have to take him down.

“Anything?” Hank asked, and Clarice fought a sigh: he’d just given away his position. She knew that he lacked her experience, that he’d probably never had to hide like this, but still.

“If I’d found anything, you’d know,” Magneto said caustically, and Clarice groaned. Hank had no reason to know better, but surely _he_ did -- he’d spent a long time hunting down the humans who tortured him, right? Clarice was pretty sure his older self had said something along those lines.

Oh well. At least she knew what she was doing. More or less.

\--

After Logan’s blatant temptation of Fate, Marie couldn’t really say she was surprised when Ororo, slightly out of breath, found them. For most of the time Marie had known her, the woman’s serenity had seemed like a soothing balm, broken only when she used her powers, when she became Storm. Now, however, she looked just as frazzled as Marie had felt...well, really since she’d got here.

“They’ve lost Trask in the basement,” she said bluntly. “Clarice, Hank, and Magneto are down there searching for him, but Logan, we either need your senses, or Charles’s telepathy. Just how big is that basement, anyway?”

Marie winced, Logan rolled his eyes, and the Professor, looking very pained, pinched the bridge of his nose. “Huge,” he said, sounding resigned. “It runs the length and breadth of the entire house. Is anyone guarding the kitchen?”

“Kitty and Raven. He’s not getting out that way, no matter what he does.”

“I’ll find him,” Logan grunted. “Professor, we need to talk more later. About...stuff.”

 _Oh, great, Logan_ , Marie thought. _Because_ that _wasn’t suspicious at all._ Ororo would grab that like a dog with a bone, and worry at it until she got answers. “I’ll come with,” she said, for want of anything better to do.

“Actually, Marie, I’d like to talk to you,” the Professor said. “I trust Ororo to make sure nobody actually kills Trask, whenever they find him.”

Logan looked insulted, but Ororo actually smiled a little. “I’ll do my best,” she said. “Come on, Logan. There’s no way they’re going to find him without help.”

The pair left, and Marie turned to the Professor, curious. He looked slightly less strained now that the others were gone.

“I need to know,” he said gently, “if there’s anything you’ve held back. When we find the others, you’ve got a better chance of connecting with them than anyone else. You’re the only one who’s seen the true devastation of your war firsthand.”

Marie shivered. “I showed you everythin’ there was to see,” she said. “Everythin’ I remember. D’you -- is that what you’re wantin’? To go in and find anythin’ I can’t remember?”

“If you’ll allow me. Those memories I can wipe again, when I’m through. I wouldn’t be taking anything you hadn’t already lost.”

She hunched in her seat, wanting so, so badly to say no -- but if there was anything there, anything that could help, she owed it to the entire future to let him try. Eventually, she nodded.

Marie never did remember what happened next. It must have taken a while, because when she came back to herself, full evening had fallen, the light of the setting sun painting much of the room crimson. The Professor was staring at her, stricken in a way he hadn’t been even when he first looked into her mind. Whatever he’d seen, she was damn glad she’d let him erase it, because he looked for all the world like he was on the edge of tears.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice hoarse. “I’m so, so sorry. You’ll never remember that. Any of it. And you’ll never go back to anything like it again.” His steely determination, while touching, was also a little unsettling. What had he _seen_ in her mind?

She didn’t want to ask, or even guess. Whatever it had been, it was in the past, now. “Thanks,” she said, not knowing what else to say. “Did you get anythin’ useful?”

He nodded. His face, even in the light of the sunset, was grey. “I did,” he said. “I think I know why and how the second Sentinel War happened.”

 _That_ gave her a jolt. He’d found that in her head? She was even more glad that he’d taken it all out -- whatever it even was. If it was something that terrible, she didn’t wonder why she’d repressed it. What she did wonder, however, was how. She had no telepathic powers of her own -- while it was fairly easy for her to lock away the other people within her mind, she couldn’t, so far as she knew, shut anything of herself in a mental prison.

“Um,” she said, and paused. No further words would come. “D’you think we should go help them find Trask?” she asked, a little helplessly.

Even if he hadn’t read her mind, the Professor seemed to understand. “Of course. I do hope no one actually hurts him, when he’s found.”

Given that it was, well, this group they were talking about, Marie wasn’t going to hold her breath. More specifically, it was _Logan_ that worried her -- Logan and his tendency to use his claws whether he meant to or not.

The house was so huge that it took them a few minutes to reach the kitchen. When they finally arrived, she took in the scene with a groan.

The mess she could understand -- it looked like someone had been cooking, and used every dish the kitchen had. The rest of it, though...the kitchen table had been moved and jammed against the sliding door, making a rather effective barricade. The pantry door was shut, and had all the chairs piled against it, in addition to their makeshift lock. Kitty and Raven were sitting on the floor, backs against the cupboards, eating directly out of a huge tub of ice cream and watching the door with almost exaggerated patience. Ororo was nowhere to be seen, which meant she’d probably joined Logan in the basement.

“You don’t want to ask,” Kitty said, before Marie could even open her mouth. “Trust me. Professor, why would you get ice cream, but no chocolate syrup?”

The Professor covered his face with one hand, but Marie, who had had just about enough of the entire world, grabbed a spoon and sat on Kitty’s other side. “Gimme,” she said.

Kitty burst out laughing, and immediately winced. What with everything, she never had seen a real doctor, which worried Marie a little. While she herself had theoretically been hit by a car, Logan had barely tapped her -- all she had to show for it was a slight bruise on her right hip. Kitty, however, still had that rather fantastic bruise on her forehead, which was still a deep purple even two days later, and her knee was swollen to somewhat unnatural proportions. Hank meant well, and seemed to have some medical training, but Marie was pretty sure he wasn’t actually a doctor yet. A real doctor was probably not an option, since one would ask all sorts of questions they couldn’t exactly answer. And Marie really didn’t want to know why Kitty was covered in dust.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a rather impressive stream of curses from behind the pantry door. Though the sound was muffled, she was pretty sure she heard Trask’s voice was well as Logan’s -- which she hoped was a good sign. If Trask could still swear, he couldn’t be in _too_ much pain.

She glanced at Kitty and Raven. The two of them were red-faced, their shoulders shaking, very obviously restraining what would be rather inappropriate amusement. Raven hopped to her feet and went to un-stack the chairs, ignoring the Professor’s long-suffering sigh.

As soon as she’d undone the bolt, an extraordinarily annoyed Logan stomped out. His hair and shirt were frosted with dust and ancient cobwebs. What little patience he had, she could tell, was hanging by a thread, so she pointed at the refrigerator and said the one word she was certain would soothe his temper: “Beer.”

A little of the aggravation cleared from his expression as he stalked to the fridge, yanking it open with rather more force than was necessary. 

Clarice, looking every bit as irritated (and a little drunk) stomped in after him. She was even dustier, and had somehow managed to smudge her face even through the ski mask, which she ripped off and threw at the counter. Hell, even _Hank_ looked like he was close to the end of his tether -- though none of them, even Logan, had a patch on Magneto. Logan looked ready to explode, but Magneto looked prepared to outright murder someone -- possibly because he’d very obviously walked through a dirty cobweb. 

Raven rolled her eyes again, and peered through the door to check on Trask. “He’s not dead, is he?” she asked.

“No,” Logan snapped. “We didn’t kill him and we didn’t break any of his bones, but he’s not happy right now, the little shit. We sealed off the trapdoor, but I doubt he’d go down there again anyway. Thought he was gonna piss his pants when we found him.” His tone suggested he wouldn’t have minded, either.

Magneto grimaced. “At least we were spared _that_ ,” he said.

Clarice grabbed the washcloth and ran it under the tap. “You know what we need?” she said, to everyone and no one. “Vlad the Inebriator.” She scrubbed at her face, hard, leaving her skin red and almost raw.

“...What?” Hank asked, though his tone indicated he really didn’t want an answer to that.

“It’s a drink Clarice invented, back before everything went to shit,” Kitty supplied. “Except we don’t have any chocolate syrup.”

“We can live without it, as long as we’ve got some Bailey’s,” Clarice said. “I need to check the liquor cabinet for a few things, first.”

Rogue groaned. While she’d never tried the drink herself, from everything she’d seen, it was A.) delicious, and B.) dangerous. The one time she’d been around when Clarice made it, it had gotten _Logan_ totally crocked.

Still, there wasn’t much point in protesting. She doubted many of them would actually drink it -- she wasn’t the only one who didn’t like losing control of her faculties. Some of the others, though.... “Kitty, don’t you dare,” she said.

Kitty grimaced. “Trust me, I don’t want to. Bourbon and Vicoden were enough.”

Hank rounded on her. “You did _what_?” he demanded. “I thought you said you were a medic, not an idiot.”

“So very many things I could say to that,” Magneto intoned, ignoring Kitty’s blistering glare. Marie was fairly sure it promised croutons, spiders, or both in the near future. Honestly, the two were starting to weird her out a little, for reasons she really didn’t want to speculate. Some things were just _wrong_.

She traded an unreadable glance with Clarice. Marie really hoped she was imagining the guilt in it. Neither said anything, which struck her as just as tad ominous.

Shaking her head, she left them to it, instead grabbing a beer and joining Logan in one of the chairs near the sliding door. “Trask actually okay?” she asked, quietly.

He snorted. “Mostly. Somebody beat us to the punch, druggin’ him, and I think I know who. Won’t dose him with ours ’til tomorrow, just in case.”

Marie pinched her nose, very much like the Professor had done. Part of her hoped they’d all be up too late for Logan to cook his...whatever. “Have some things to tell you, later,” she said, even more quietly. “What the Professor wanted me to stay behind for.”

Logan looked at her, searchingly. His scrutiny was unlike that of anyone she’d ever known, but coming from him, it didn’t freak her out. “You okay?”

She nodded. “ _I_ am,” she said, “but the Professor -- whatever he saw, I don’t remember, but it had to be bad. Never seen him so scared, in the future or here.”

Logan sighed. “Then let’s get some food in you, and go talk.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, Trask. I’d feel sorry for you if you didn’t deserve it. And of course Rogue had to join Ororo and Clarice on the Wrong Conclusions Bandwagon.


	12. Instinct, Nightmares, and Revelations.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Long chapter is long. In which more is revealed, everyone is unsettled, nightmares are passed around, Logan and Rogue continue to be adorable, and Kitty and Erik continue to be blissfully ignorant of the fact that they’re creeping everybody out.

Logan and Marie’s talk wound up including Ororo, the Professor, and Raven. Logan was deeply uncertain the last one should be there at all -- she might be on their side, but future-Mystique was ruthless as hell, and this one had been totally willing to murder Trask. He wasn’t sure just how much he could trust her, but at least the Professor could sift through her brain if he had to.

He sat on the worn, antique sofa, one arm around Marie, who felt far too cold even through the fabric of her shirt. That was, he knew, one of the symptoms of shock, though she looked -- and, more importantly, smelled -- otherwise okay. Stunned, and rather unhappy, but she wasn’t going to go into a fugue or anything.

“What’s this about?” Ororo asked, perched on top of a dresser.

“Marie was gracious enough to let me look into her mind,” the Professor said. He sounded weary in a way Logan associated with his much older self. “Some of what I saw there has told me why the other time-travelers might be here.” 

He paused, but nobody tried to prod him. When he continued, his voice wasn’t quite steady. “There were dissidents, within the camps,” he said at last. “Employees, not prisoners. They planned to plant a virus into the mainframe that controlled the Sentinels, to destroy them all at once. The plan was discovered, and in theory they were all caught and killed. If what the others from the future say is true, one of the dissenters must have survived.”

“How --” Ororo started, but he held up a hand.

“Don’t ask,” he said. “I mean it. I saw what I saw, and I don’t want to explain. For Marie’s sake as well as my own.”

“That’s what was there?” Marie asked. “What I’d forgotten, and you found?”

He nodded. “You didn’t forget, Marie -- you repressed. With good reason. Now, I don’t yet know where the others are being held, but once I find them, we have to go break them out,” he said to Ororo and Raven. “We can’t let them try to change the future independently of us. If we’re working at cross-purposes, God knows what damage we’ll do. We need to get rid of Trask, and bring them here.”

“I thought we had to keep Trask the full three days,” Raven protested. “Not because of them, but because of the conference.”

“That’s likely going to go on much longer than three days,” the Professor said. “We’ve achieved our objective -- he’s been kidnapped and held hostage by ‘humans’, unless anyone gave themselves away while hunting for him in the basement.”

“They didn’t,” Logan said. “Trust me, I’d’ve known. It’s why they were all so pissed off when they came topside again. Had to find him the normal way.”

He doubted he imagined the Professor’s silent sigh of relief. “Logan, I know you have plans for that bag in the garden,” he said. “I would advise you to wait, given what Clarice and Kitty did. As much as most of you would like to legitimately poison him, I have plans for him.”

Logan desperately wanted to ask just what they might be, but he knew better -- if the Professor wanted them to know, he’d tell them. As he said nothing further, he obviously didn’t want anyone else in on it. Yet.

“Are we going to bring the others back here?” Raven asked, and Logan thought he knew exactly what was going through her head. If they didn’t want to stay, the mansion was hardly constructed as a prison -- and locking anybody in the basement really wasn’t to be thought of. Oh, there were a few people he’d happily stuff down there, but these other people had probably come from a future just as bad as his group’s, if not worse.

“No,” the Professor said. “It won’t be safe, keeping them in France. We’ll take them back to New York with us.”

There had been six people in that van. Their own group numbered eight already -- the Professor’s plane might be fairly decent-sized, but cramming fourteen people in it wasn’t going to be fun. Especially since their group was...well, what it was. If the other was even half as fragmented, they were in serious trouble.

“Then what?” Marie asked. She was still shivering a little, and Logan’s arm tightened around her, just a fraction. She gave him a grateful look.

“We can’t make any further plans until we talk to them,” the Professor said. “We have to find out what they know -- just what _their_ future is like.”

Logan was pretty sure that was Professor-speak for ‘I need to read their minds.’ Fair enough. “When will your sources get back to you?” he asked. “How long until we know where they’re being held?”

The Professor shrugged. “I can’t be certain,” he said. “Very soon, if they’re anything like as efficient as they were when my father used them.”

It was downright weird, hearing him talk about his father. In the future, Logan had known him for over twenty years, and he’d never once mentioned either parent. There were no mementos of them anywhere in the school, unless he kept them in his private rooms. It was a subject Logan knew better than to push, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t curious.

“We’d better make sure everything’s ready to move, then,” Raven said. “Immediately, if we have to. Not that we brought a lot with us.”

“No,” the Professor said, “we didn’t. I’ll need to order a few more things for the trip back.”

“What do we do if the airport doesn’t want to let us back onto the plane?” Marie asked. “If they’re still pissed about whatever the baggage guy said about us?”

“The ‘baggage guy’ ran over Kitty,” Logan snarled. “Anybody tries to give us shit, I’ll just remind ’em of that.” Forcefully, if he had to.

“That won’t be necessary,” the Professor said, tapping his temple. “Nobody’s going to stop us doing anything now.”

\--

Downstairs, Vlad the Inebriator had done his work a little too well on Clarice and Hank.

Kitty hadn’t needed Hank’s urging to abstain. Her earlier combination of alcohol and opiates had left her feeling quite sick to her stomach, so she sat on the floor and nibbled on bread. While she knew quite well what Clarice was like when drunk, Hank was a whole other story entirely. Apparently, he liked to sing.

He put his heart and soul into it, too, but unlike Trask, she was pretty sure his voice wouldn’t sound pleasant under any circumstances. It had Clarice in stitches, but to Kitty it just sounded like someone was dragging a cat behind a car. Over gravel.

Magneto had actually been talked into a glass -- _one_ glass. The only noticeable result was the fact that, for once, he didn’t look like he wanted to kill everyone in the immediate vicinity with a rusty fork. He was sitting on the table, watching the drunken pair with the fascination of a zoologist studying some rare new species.

“Is he like that in the future?” he asked, at last, nodding to Hank.

Kitty snorted. “No,” she said. “Not at all. Seeing him young is even weirder than you and the Professor.”

“What _are_ we like, in the future?” The fact that he’d asked the question at all told her that the alcohol had done _something_ ; had he been sober, even if he’d cared to know, she was sure he wouldn’t have said anything.

She was quiet a moment, considering, still nibbling bread. “The Professor’s a bit like he is now, really,” she said. “He’s got that same...empathy. He’s just a lot wiser, and if he ever gets really angry, he never lets on like this one. He almost seems like he’s...well, _more_ , somehow, than the rest of us. By the time we all came back here, he was the one everybody leaned on -- even you.”

“And me?” he asked, genuine curiosity in his voice.

That took her another moment of consideration. “Well, I never met you before everything went to hell,” she said, “but you seem to regret...everything. I heard you tell the Professor that you’d wasted so many years, fighting him and all of us with him. That you’d give anything to have a few of them back. Which, I wish you’d figured that out ages ago, before you tried to murder Rogue.”

Now he was the quiet one. There were still enough painkillers lingering in her system that she imagined she could actually see the gears turning in his mind. He drained the last of his glass, staring at nothing. “To be fair,” he said at last, “while my future self tried to kill your friend, _I_ haven’t. Did I really fail so very badly?”

Kitty eyed him, deeply suspicious. Oh, he _sounded_ genuine, but he was still...him. A lying liar who lied like a rug. “Yup,” she said. “Like I said, all you ever accomplished was getting a lot of humans and mutants killed. I mean, I sort of know why -- Rogue used to have your nightmares sometimes, after the Statue of Liberty -- but still. You went just a _tad_ overboard.”

He looked at her sharply, genuinely startled. “ _What?_ ”

She grimaced. “That’s right, you wouldn’t know that. Rogue, when she absorbs someone’s powers, also absorbs their memories. The longer the contact goes on, the more she gets. Apparently, in the future you have some killer nightmares about...you know, where you came from.” She was actually making an effort not to be insensitive, though since it was her, she possibly wasn’t succeeding very well.

“How does she not hate me?” he wondered aloud.

“She’s a forgiving person,” Kitty said. “And she’s gone through worse, I’m sure, since then. I mean, it was bad enough for all of us, but we weren’t in the camps. Most of the people I know died, but at least I didn’t have to watch _all_ of them.” No, what she’d seen had been bad enough. What she didn’t understand was how Rogue was still anything like _sane_. Then again, she might not be, if she hadn’t run into Logan -- literally, apparently -- as soon as she reached the past.

In the cupboard, Trask groaned, loudly enough that they could actually hear him over Hank’s abysmal singing. Kitty didn’t know just what the group in the basement had done to him, when they finally caught him again, and she didn’t think she wanted to.

With a scowl, she grabbed one of Clarice’s discarded shoes -- a fantastically ugly, lime-green vinyl platform -- and hurled it at the door as hard as she could. “Can it, short stuff!”

“What the hell, Kitty?!” Clarice yelped. “Don’t break my shoes!”

“Sorry,” Kitty said, though she was anything but.

There was a faint, spluttering choke from the direction of the table. When she looked at Magneto, she found him trying desperately to keep a straight face, head in his hands. Evidently he decided it wasn’t worth the effort, because he broke down laughing.

That cut off Hank’s warbling. His eyes had gone huge -- he looked so much like a terrified rabbit that Kitty cracked up, too. It made her ribs hurt, but she just couldn’t help it.

Unfortunately, it also jolted her stomach, and she barely managed to crawl to the trash can before her stomach won its mutiny with the rest of her. Stew, bread, and bourbon, unsurprisingly, were not half as tasty coming back up as they were going down, and she was bitterly regretting that painkiller now. Especially since the effects had completely worn off.

“Fuck my life,” she muttered, and retched. 

Dimly, she heard the kitchen tap turn on. A pair of shoes entered her view. “Throw up on my feet and I’ll drop this on your head,” Magneto warned, setting the glass of water beside her. “Drink that.”

She retched again before she dared lean away from the trash can. “Thanks,” she said, grimacing a little as the water washed away the sour taste of puke. 

“Are you all right?” Hank asked. He might be drunk, but apparently his caretaker instincts were still on full-force.

Kitty scowled at him. “Do I _look_ all right?” she demanded, and turned away to make use of the can again. Ugh.

“Drink that,” Magneto reiterated. “Slowly.”

Miserable though she was, Kitty could recognize the echo of her own words on the plane. She swigged, spat, swigged again, and swallowed. “Are you gonna sit there and wait for me to down this whole thing?”

He arched an eyebrow, his expression so smug that she desperately wanted to hit him. “Yup,” he deadpanned.

\--

Tired though Marie was, she knew it would be a long while before she could sleep. While she was glad the Professor had taken whatever memories he’d seen with him, after all he’d said, she couldn’t help but wonder just what they _were_. How would she have known about anybody trying to sabotage the Sentinels? Had she somehow been in on it? She supposed it would make sense, that they wouldn’t kill her for it -- she’d been, she thought bitterly, a _valuable asset_. But it probably meant whatever they’d done to the others had been so terrible her own brain had shut it away.

She was curled up on the couch now, head on Logan’s chest, the sound of his heartbeat and the scent of the summer night calming her a little. He knew her well enough to know when she needed to just sit -- that there were times she needed company, not speech. The nature of mutation meant she perennially touch-starved, and while he couldn’t touch her directly, she knew that he valued what he could give her. She knew he was the only person who could do it without tension, without flinching. 

The others, her friends from before -- Kitty and Jubilee especially would consciously touch her arm or her back, and Bobby had certainly tried, but it was just that: conscious. They’d wanted to let her know that they weren’t afraid of her, that she didn’t need to be afraid of herself, but all of them, even Bobby, were still wary underneath it all. Logan had never been wary, even when he really should have been.

“What d’you wanna do,” she asked abruptly, “when everythin’s...over? Once we get everyone back to New York, and figure out what the other guys are doin’, what they want? I mean, sooner or later, things go on, right?”

She felt him shrug. “Whatever you wanna do, darlin’,” he said. “Nothin’ in this time I’m supposed to be doin’ that’d effect the future. You know the Professor’ll always let us stay with him.”

Marie shut her eyes, warmed through. While she wanted to trust most of the others, she _did_ trust Logan. “Suppose he’ll still need to form the X-Men, no matter what happens,” she said. “Although I don’t know what’s gonna happen when he finds young Ororo. Pretty sure bad things can happen, if two people from different times meet up.”

“Hope that’s just science fiction,” Logan grumbled. “If not, we’re gonna have a problem further down the line, when you and Kitty and Clarice’re all kids.”

She fingered the white section of her hair, as she often did when she was thinking. “You think we can keep Magneto from tryin’ to kill young me, this time? I’d rather she not have to go through that, too.”

“Bet your ass we can. Assumin’ he’s even stupid enough to try, with all he’s found out abut the future. And there’s a thing, Marie -- right now, the body I’m in, is the one I had in 1973. There isn’t any other me runnin’ around, so when the time comes, I’m gonna have to go find the younger you.” He paused. “Goddamn, that sounds weird. Anyway, I’ve gotta find you and bring you to the school, too.”

Marie did the math in her head. God, that was twenty-seven years from now. She’d be in her _fifties_ by then. “Won’t that be weird,” she said. “How d’you know about this body? Your claws?”

“Yeah. Still bone. At least this time I can avoid Stryker.”

Marie shivered. She still occasionally had his nightmares, though she’d never tell him that. “We might both be better off, this time around.”

“Damn right we will. I just want to get back over the damn Atlantic already. France makes me twitchy.”

She sat up enough to give him a bewildered look. “Why?”

“I’m not sure,” he admitted, disgruntled. “There’s just somethin’ _wrong_ here.” There was more, she was quite sure, but she was equally sure he wouldn’t tell her. Not unless he thought it was actually dangerous.

Honestly, she was sort of glad. This mansion was really nothing like the one in New York, and not just because the other had been her home. Something about it gave her the willies, and she doubted she was the only one. The others, despite their frictions, never seemed to wander around inside alone for very long. Ororo spent most of her time in the garden, and Marie was pretty sure Raven was often with Hank. The Professor was the only one who didn’t seem to be affected by it.

“What,” she asked, “you think it’s haunted?”

It was meant as a joke, but Logan didn’t laugh. “I don’t think it’s _haunted_ , but...I don’t like what I felt, down in that basement. There wasn’t anything actually with us down there, but it felt like there _should_ have been, if that makes any sense. If Hank was himself, he’d have sensed it, too. Maybe he did -- he’s been so jumpy anyway that it’s hard to tell.”

Marie shuddered. She thought of Clarice and Kitty, both of whom had, so far as she knew, staked out their own rooms last night. Of course it wasn’t likely that anything would happen to them, but still...dammit, now her imagination was running away with her. “Don’t think I wanna go wanderin’ around by myself, now,” she said, laying down again, head tucked under Logan’s chin. 

“Good,” he said emphatically. “I’d warn the others, if I thought it’d do any good. ’Course it’s probably bullshit anyway, but still...I don’t like it, and I don’t like this house. Be glad as hell to get out.”

Marie had to agree. _She_ was glad as hell to have him here right now. She didn’t think she’d ever get any sleep now, otherwise.

\--

Clarice woke the next morning on the lawn, of all places. She’d drooled on her own arm in the night, and she grimaced when she sat up.

Pain exploded through her head, and she had to shield her eyes from the sunrise with one hand. Inexplicably, her arm was covered with elaborate swirls and spirals drawn in black Sharpie. Clearly, there was quite a bit of last night she couldn’t remember. Her mouth tasted absolutely foul, and her tongue felt like it was coated in glue. Now she remembered, far too late, why Vlad the Inebriator rarely saw the light of day.

Standing seemed like far too much effort, so she crawled across the dewy grass until she reached the patio. The sliding-glass door was shut, but thankfully it wasn’t locked. Opening it was enough of a bitch as it was.

Ororo, sober and hangover-free, sat at the kitchen table. Someone -- probably her -- had cleaned up the kitchen at some point after Clarice passed out. Hank was nowhere to be seen, which made Clarice just a bit grumpy -- he’d staggered off to bed and left her on the lawn? Kitty physically couldn’t have helped her in, and Magneto was a jerk, but she’d expected better of Hank.

The scent of coffee drifting from the corner improved her mood a little, though she knew she really ought to start with water, if she ever wanted to kill this headache. She gave Ororo a nod, and immediately winced.

“Any idea why I was on the lawn?” she asked, gingerly reaching into the cupboard for a glass.

“You were rather adamant that you didn’t want to go inside,” Ororo said, but there was a faint note of worry, rather than amusement, in her tone. “Tell me, did you dream last night?”

“If I did, I don’t remember it,” Clarice said, filling the glass and gulping the water down in three long swallows. It soothed her parched throat, even if it didn’t do anything for the fuzz on her teeth. “Why?”

“Hank had terrible nightmares,” Ororo replied. “Logan so rarely sleeps that I can’t tell with him, but Magneto looked terrible when he came through and grabbed coffee. If he slept, he didn’t do it well, and he wasn’t half so drunk as you and Hank last night. Trask panicked until I gave him a sedative. Tell me,” she said, seriously, “do you like this house?”

“I -- well, honestly, no,” Clarice said, reaching for the last piece of bread. “I mean, it’s beautiful, but there’s just...”

“....Something wrong?” Ororo offered. “I know. I felt it even before the basement was opened, but I didn’t recognize it for what it was. I’m going to talk to the Professor about leaving.”

Clarice stared at her. “ _Really?_ I mean, do you think he’d even listen? We could just be paranoid.” Even as she said it, though, she doubted it. 

“We might be,” Storm allowed, “but you and I haven’t survived so long by discounting our intuition. It wouldn’t pay to ignore it now.”

She had to agree, even if it also made her feel like a fool. Ororo was right -- they hadn’t made it in the future by ignoring their instincts. How the hell were they going to get that across to the Professor, though, without sounding insane? He’d been here before, and he wouldn’t have brought them if he thought there was anything...off...in the house.

Clarice didn’t believe in ghosts. She’d seen far too many very real horrors to give any credence to the supernatural. There were, however, plenty of Wrong Things that actually existed -- God knew she’d seen enough of them -- and the fact that she couldn’t identify this one didn’t mean it wasn’t there.

Rogue and Logan came in together -- surprise, surprise -- while she was halfway through her coffee. They were shortly followed by a very hung-over Hank, who looked about as bad as Clarice felt, and the Professor, who was pale and deeply troubled. Last to join them were Kitty and Raven, the former leaning heavily on the latter’s arm.

“Show of hands,” Kitty said, gingerly sitting at the table, “who had nightmares last night? Out of everyone who actually slept, I mean.”

To Clarice’s surprise, everyone but Logan raised their hands -- and she suspected he was outlier only because he hadn’t gone to sleep. But then, of course he wouldn’t have: if he’d suspected anything weird, he’d have stayed awake to guard Rogue while she slept. The two of them were so sweet it was honestly a little disgusting.

She was quite shocked to find the Professor had had them, too, though. But then, she probably shouldn’t be -- he was, after all, a telepath. If there was something nasty here, he’d know -- but then, why hadn’t he said anything before? Or had he not felt it until the basement was opened? Now _that_ was a spooky thought.

“Magneto didn’t say,” Ororo said, “but he didn’t look like he slept well, when he came stomping through here earlier. I’m not sure where he went, either.”

“ _That’s_ comforting,” Clarice muttered. “He didn’t run off with the van or anything, did he?”

“No. But he obviously wanted to get away.” Ororo looked at the Professor. “We need to leave,” she said, in a tone that would brook no argument.

He sighed. “I know. Someday, when I have time, I want to find out just what happened here. For now, I’m shutting up the house. I don’t want any caretakers in here, even for a little while. Logan, give Trask your...concoction...and we’ll drop him off somewhere well outside Paris. The rest of you, get your things.”

Hank looked at Raven, and Clarice didn’t need the Professor’s telepathy to know what he was thinking: he wanted to grab whatever they’d been cooking in the lab. She gave him a very slight nod, and the pair left together -- her striding, him shuffling.

Marie glanced at Logan. “We’ve already got all our crap. Kitty, you need a hand?”

She shrugged. “I don’t have any spare clothes or anything. Clarice?”

“Ditto. We should grab some crap for your knee, though. And your head. And your ribs. You really are just one walking piece of broken, aren’t you?”

Kitty scowled. “You are so lucky you’re hungover,” she said. “I know what I need to grab: the croutons.”

“As long as you don’t bring any spiders,” Clarice muttered. She didn’t miss the way Rogue shivered.

“I’ll go with you, to grab some supplies from the medicine cabinet,” Ororo said. 

Now it was Clarice who shivered. Still, if it came down to it, she could easily portal herself and Ororo away from...anything. Whatever. She didn’t even know what she was afraid of, which just pissed her off.

She stood, a bit unsteadily, but before she and Ororo made it out of the kitchen, Magneto stalked in, and threw a set of car keys at Logan. Ororo had been right -- he’d had a shitty night, even if he slept at all. There were dark smudges almost the hue of bruises under his eyes, and his complexion was downright grey.

“Wow,” Kitty said, “you look like shit. What’s with the keys?”

The look he shot at her was pure poison, but it didn’t do anything to budge Clarice’s very unfortunate suspicion. Oh God, she hoped she was wrong, because that was so wrong. “I found another van,” he said to Logan, ignoring her. “Legally, this time. We’re going to need another.”

“...Why d’you say that?” Rogue asked, looking at him with deep suspicion. “Who told?”

“Nobody,” he said, with more than a little asperity. “The heating ducts in this place are amazingly good sound conductors. Did any of you even think that we’d need another vehicle? Charles, I’m sure you did.”

The Professor nodded. He looked both chagrined, and more than a little irritated at being found out. “I did. Thank you, Erik. Logan, if you would take care of Trask, we can get going soon.” He sighed. “I wish I knew just what was...here. I loved this house, when I was small.”

“You know,” Kitty said, thoughtful, “this place didn’t feel weird at all, until Trask opened the basement. Professor, did anyone ever stay here, apart from your family?”

He sighed, helpless. “I’m not sure,” he said. “I don’t think so, but I can’t be certain. If someone did -- if they were a mutant themselves -- who knows what they did down there. What they might have...left.”

Brief silence fell. “Well,” Kitty said, eventually, “on that creepy note, should we maybe get this done? Logan, did you actually cook your shit last night?”

He nodded. Rogue, Clarice was sure, must have crashed on the table while he did it, because there was no way he would have left her alone, if he’d felt what the rest of them had. 

“Good. Let’s blow this Popsicle stand. I feel like my skin might crawl off if I stay here any longer.”

Clarice had to agree. She glanced at Ororo, who headed for the hallway again.

\--

Logan, ski mask in place, went to deal with Trask, while Kitty tried to wheedle Marie into helping her to the van. She seemed to have full confidence in her friend, but Marie was a little reticent. Oh, she had her long-sleeved shirt and gloves on, but with Kitty hopping like she was, there was always the possibility of her forehead colliding with Marie’s face. Knowing poor Kitty’s luck since they’d landed in the past, it was almost a given.

“Oh, come on, Marie, please? Face it, right now I’m just a lump in the way. I’m not even hungover -- I promise I won’t throw up on you.”

“Sugar, I don’t wanna hurt you,” Marie protested. “That’s the last thing you’d need. And I know you weigh as much as a wet cat, but I don’t think I could carry a dry one right now.” She’d only been away from the camps for three days, after all: her muscles were non-existent.

Understanding entered Kitty’s eyes, and sympathy -- sympathy, not pity. Marie, given the nature of her mutation, had learned to tell the difference long ago, since she got plenty of both from people. “Gotcha,” she said. “Knee’s not so swollen anyway. Just don’t tell Hank I moved on my own, or he’ll duct-tape me to the inside of the van or something.”

Marie wanted to laugh, but she honestly wouldn’t put it past the poor frazzled man.

“As entertaining as I’m sure that would be for all of us, you’re enough of a liability as it is.” Christ, Magneto could appear like a damn ghost when he wanted to -- he wasn’t Logan-level stealthy, but it was bad enough. He was holding a cane with a rather ornate silver handle. “May you have better luck with this than I did.”

Marie blinked, but Kitty eyed the cane with deep suspicion. “What did you do to it?” she asked.

He actually rolled his eyes. “ _Nothing_ ,” he said, exuding exasperation like an aura. “Get to the van before you somehow fall into a hole and break your leg.”

She glowered at him, snatching the cane, and actually spend a few moments inspecting the handle, as though she expected to find it coated with motor oil or some other slippery substance. “Thanks,” she said, grudgingly, and hauled herself to her feet.

“Be careful. If you fall on your face, I’m not catching you.”

“Jerk.”

“Bitch.”

“Holy shit, you can swear. Really swear, not just ‘damn’. Plebe.”

“I’m not dignifying that with a response.”

“Uh, dude, you just did.”

Marie shook her head. Wrong. So very, very wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At this point, even I don't know what the fuck is up with Erik and Kitty. All I do know is that I seriously pity whoever spills the beans about The Assumptions, because it will not end well. I haven't yet decided who's going to be on the receiving end of that shitstorm, but it will be epic.
> 
> The creepiness in the mansion will be important later. Very important.


	13. Road Rage, Rescues, and More (Unwanted) Revelations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which there is a not-so-heroic rescue, terrible hangovers and even worse driving, a near escape, and the first stirrings of one mother of a shitstorm.

Logan, the Professor, and Rogue took the newer van, with the drugged Trask tied up in the back. The rest of them crammed into the older vehicle, since once they rescued the others, that group was definitely going to want to stay together. 

Fortunately, the Professor’s contact had come through for them at two in the morning, so they actually knew where they were going. While everyone in the older van might grumble about being once again crammed in like sardines, the fact that they wouldn’t have to put up with Logan’s driving went a long way to mollifying them. Instead, Raven had the wheel, with Ororo as her co-pilot.

That left Kitty, Clarice, Hank, and Magneto in the back, all of whom were rather grumpy. Clarice and Hank were still mightily hungover, and Kitty made a point of sitting a little away from them, behind Ororo’s seat, just in case one or both got sick on the drive. She still had the cane, and she was fully prepared to shove one of them with it if necessary.

Magneto seemed to have the same idea, though he stayed near the doors at the back. He was nursing a cup of coffee, and receiving venomous glares from the rest of them, who hadn’t had enough foresight to grab any themselves. His insufferably smug expression just made it worse, which made Kitty wish she’d grabbed the bag of croutons. Alas, she had nothing to fling.

The Professor had laid out his plan before they started off. He, Logan, and Ororo were going to go into the facility to get the other group, using his telepathy to stop anyone asking questions. In theory it was a simple plan, but nothing ever went simply for this herd of misfits, so there was private agreement among the rest of them that they’d wade in when -- _when_ , not _if_ \-- it became necessary. 

Well, everyone but Kitty, whose knee was still unbearably stiff. In spite of the Tylenol she’d swallowed earlier, her ribs and head still hurt, all of which rendered her pretty much useless. A large part of why she’d got so pissed off when Magneto called her a liability was because he was right, and she knew it. Granted, at the moment Clarice and Hank weren’t much better -- they could throw up on people, if need be, but that was about it.

She caught another whiff of coffee, and made a face at Magneto. Childish, maybe, but she didn’t care. They were embarking on something that had the potential to go disastrously wrong, and she was both sore and severely under-caffeinated. She’d try to smack him with the cane if it hadn’t had metal in it -- as it was, he could easily hit _her_ with it if she tried.

No, she had no coffee, and nothing else to do, so she curled up behind the seat -- slightly awkwardly, since she couldn’t really bend her knee -- and went to sleep.

\--

Marie was a little surprised at how nervous she wasn’t.

She knew exactly what they were about to attempt, and just how horribly it could go wrong. It would be wisest to prepare for some kind of attack, to have to abandon the van if need be, but...she really wasn’t fazed. Perhaps the camps had burned more than some physical nerves out of her.

Logan and the Professor were quiet, and Trask did nothing but mutter incoherently. Logan had said that acid could take up to an hour to take effect, but that they’d know when it did. Meanwhile, she had nothing to do but sit, and watch, and wonder.

Part of her was quite curious about whatever it was they’d left at the mansion, but most of her emphatically did not want to know. She had enough nightmares as it was, and yet she couldn’t shake the feeling that it was going to be important later. All in all, she’d prefer to have the Atlantic Ocean between her and that house.

She shivered, and let her mind wander elsewhere. Mostly it went to the other mansion, the place she’d once called home, and would soon be her home again. She’d enjoyed being free, the last few days, but part of her still longed for a place to _stay_. When she was younger, she’d liked the idea of being a nomad, but not anymore. 

Trask groaned, and she eyed him uneasily. If he decided to flip out, she was still too weak to do much of anything about it.

“Don’t worry,” Logan said, as though he’d read her mind. “He won’t be movin’ much for a while yet.”

“If you say so,” Marie muttered. 

The drive felt every bit as long as it actually was. By the time they reached Paris, Trask was much more active, even if he couldn’t actually do much. She was quite relieved when they detoured into a back alley, where she could untie him and set him free. Whatever came next, for him or for them, he was no longer their problem.

“All right,” the Professor said, and she didn’t think she was imagining the relief in his voice -- maybe he was as glad to have Trask gone as she was. “Marie, you’re going to have to be prepared to be our getaway driver, if things go...poorly. The others will be parked out of sight, but if Logan, Ororo, and I need help, I’ll signal. No matter what happens, you can’t come in yourself. If we lose this van, we’re in a lot of trouble.”

“Gotcha,” she said. She didn’t bother wondering if the emphasis on her stay out of it all was Logan’s idea, because she was quite sure it was. If she’d been in better physical condition, she would have resented it, but as it was, she was all too aware of her current limitations. A few days of solid meals couldn’t make up for years of malnutrition.

They parked near the back end of the lot, near a tall building that was so nondescript it could only have been designed that way on purpose. Nothing wound up that bland by accident: the walls were grey and smooth, with none of the decorative effort made by the businesses around it. Rather than blend in with its surroundings, its plainness made it very conspicuous.

Logan snorted. “French government stooges as stupid as the ones we’ve got in America, huh? Great.” He shook his head as he got out, swinging around back to grab the Professor’s wheelchair. Marie took over his seat, adjusting it so she could reach the pedals with more than just her toes.

“I’d tell you to be careful,” she said, “but I know there’s no point. Try not to break any limbs, okay?”

He grinned at her as he helped the Professor into the chair. “I’ll try, but I can’t make any promises.” 

“ _I_ can,” the Professor said, dryly. “It’s not like it was in the Pentagon, Logan. This time, my mutation’s on.”

Marie would swear Logan was almost disappointed by that. It was all she could do not to laugh. “I’ll be right here,” she promised. “Not goin’ anywhere without all of you.”

\--

Ororo finished tying the scarf on her head, eyeing her reflection critically. Her hair was rather distinctive, and even with the Professor mentally manipulating the people in the building, she’d rather not appear at all memorable.

She knew Raven wanted to go in as well, but that would mean leaving Magneto as the only fully-functional person in the van. While he had behaved himself the last few days, that didn’t mean he was trustworthy. And it wasn’t like the other three were in any condition to take him down, if he did decide to do something...stupid.

Raven handed her a small, brown cardboard box. “Take that with you,” she said. “It’s not what we made it for, but it might be useful.”

Ororo looked at her, and at it. “It’s your bomb, isn’t it,” she said, and it wasn’t a question.

“Not a bomb,” Hank supplied from the back. “I mean, not a normal bomb. Plant it somewhere it won’t be found, if you can -- in a supply closet or something.”

She looked at the box. Hank, she was sure, wouldn’t make something just to kill people, but that didn’t give her any insight into what the thing might actually be. She’d have to trust him -- she _wanted_ to trust him -- but this Hank McCoy was a stranger to her. He was not the Beast she had known for so many years.

Still, she’d give him the benefit of the doubt. The thin, nervous man behind her did not have the air of a killer anywhere about him.

“I’ll try,” she said. “One way or the other, I doubt this will take long.” Either they’d get the others out without a hitch -- doubtful -- or they’d have to break their way out. Neither was likely to be a protracted activity.

Raven gave her a very slight, rather lopsided smile -- she knew exactly what Ororo was thinking. “Good luck,” she said. “You’re probably going to need it.”

\--

Logan was itching for a fight, and trying like hell to tamp down the urge. The Wolverine wanted to pummel someone, but _Logan_ knew that would probably end badly. He had to trust that this time, the Professor would actually know what he was doing -- and would be capable of pulling it off.

Ororo, outwardly serene as ever, joined them. No matter how calm she looked, he could hear her elevated heartbeat, and caught the faintest whiff of unease. He knew she wouldn’t fly to pieces on them, though, no matter what kind of shit hit the fan.

While the security at the entrance was quite complex for 1973, it was laughably primitive compared to what they’d dealt with in the future, even before everything went to shit. Passing through the metal detector without setting it off was...weird, but it was also a relief. One less thing to worry about. Of course they checked the Professor’s wheelchair, but even if he’d had anything to hide, he wouldn’t have let them find it. They certainly ignored the box in Ororo’s hands, though he wondered what the hell was in it. The Professor wouldn’t have let her bring it in if it was something dangerous, but it smelled very faintly like it had been cooked up in Hank and Raven’s makeshift lab. That was not reassuring.

They escaped the pat-down entirely, and moved through the hallways like they belonged there. The inside of the building was just as bland as the exterior: flat white walls, overhead fluorescent lights that buzzed erratically, and carpet that was an unfortunate shade of mustard-yellow.

There were also surprisingly few people moving around. He would have expected even a secretive government agency to be teeming with underlings, even on a Sunday, but the place looked like it was running on a skeleton crew. If the group from the future hadn’t been stupid enough to let on that they were mutants, they might even be held in a normal cell, not some weird room down in the basement.

He looked at the Professor, whose eyes had gone slightly unfocused -- he was searching, casting around with a mental fishing line to see what bit. 

“Anythin’?” Logan asked quietly.

“Below us,” he said. “Three floors down. They’ve been...interrogated.”

Logan winced. “Any of ’em give up that they were mutants?”

“No,” the Professor said, sounding both worried and intrigued, “because they’re not mutants.”

Ororo’s stride actually faltered a little. “What? Normal humans came back here? _Why?_ ”

“Think about it,” Logan said. “Lotta humans where we came from were sufferin’ just as much from the Sentinels as we were. Might be even worse in their future.” It was a somewhat troubling thought. If the humans were desperate enough to come back in time, what the hell had happened to all the mutants? Were there even mutants anymore? They’d find out soon enough, he supposed.

“I hope they’ll trust us,” Ororo murmured. “It wouldn’t make things easy, but they’d be easier.”

Logan groaned. “Why the hell did you have to go and say that?”

The Professor’s lips twitched into a small smile. “The good news is, I can control them all, if I have to. The bad news is that they certainly won’t trust us, if it’s necessary.”

“Deal with that when we get there,” Logan grunted. “Let’s go.”

The elevator, for some reason, smelled very strongly of garlic, as well as a combination of chemicals that made his sinuses itch. Just what the hell went on here?

When they reached their, floor, the smell was even worse. He’d swear he recognized elements of it -- had Stryker used any of them on him? The odor made him tense, ready for a fight, poised on the edge of shanking whoever they might find first. Adrenaline flooded his veins, sharpening his already acute vision, and he could feel the tips of his claws trying to break the skin on his hands.

They passed two people, who of course completely ignored them. Unlike those upstairs, they weren’t wearing business suits -- these had on utilitarian grey jumpsuits and shiny vinyl boots. _Only in the 70’s_ , he thought, shaking his head as he followed the Professor.

When they stopped in front of an unmarked metal door, they paused. “Now, this is going to set off an alarm,” the Professor said, “but there’s nothing to be done for it. Logan, if you please.”

Fortunately, this was long before key-cards, and the keypad lock was little more than a formality -- all he had to do was rip the doorknob off, and the door swung open obligingly.

“It’s all right,” the Professor said. “We’re here to help --”

Unfortunately, before he could finish the sentence, a man came flying out the door and punched Logan on the jaw.

The Professor put a hand over his face. “Oh, dear.”

\--

Even outside, the blare of the alarm was so loud it made Marie jump. It sounded like the sirens she’d heard in movies, the ones prisons used for riots, and it did not fill her with anything resembling confidence.

She started the van, foot on the clutch and hand hovering over the gearshift. No way was she letting Logan back behind the wheel -- not when she knew how pissed he was likely to be. She wanted to live long enough to get to the plane, thank you very much.

To her intense relief, the three that had gone in all came fleeing back out again, Ororo pushing the Professor’s wheelchair while Logan -- oh, hell. Logan was dragging two poor bastards along by the back of their necks, shaking them like disobedient puppies. The other four looked like they wanted to be anywhere else, but were following because they weren’t about to abandon the other two.

“Christ,” she muttered. She could actually feel a vein twitching in her temple.

Ororo opened the back doors, and Logan threw his two prisoners inside. When the rest hesitated, he started grabbing and shoving, until the final one scramble in of her own accord. He picked up the Professor’s chair and pushed it in as well, though markedly more carefully, before slamming the door.

“Don’t you go thinkin’ you’re gettin’ behind this wheel,” Marie warned, as he made for the driver’s-side door. “Not with the mood you’re in.”

Under most other circumstances, he probably would have argued with her, but he was smart enough to know when she meant business. “Fine,” he snarled, heading to the passenger’s side. “’Ro, go deal with your clown car. We’d better get to the airport before somebody gets smart enough to block the road.”

“Hang on back there,” Marie said, and stomped the gas before Logan had even shut the door.

It had been a long time since she’d driven a stick, and she made the mistake of slapping it straight into second. The engine growled protest, the entire van shuddered, but off they shot, tires screeching as she almost plowed into a passing bus. The horde in the back was screaming and swearing, Logan had halfway crashed into the dashboard, and Marie -- Marie was having the time of her fucking life.

Ever since she’d first gone to the camps, she’d been powerless. Despite the fact that she’d been free for the last three days, she’d still _felt_ powerless. Oh, she had her mutation again -- her lethal, horrible, curse-of-the-ancients style mutation -- but that was only useful if she was close enough to actually touch someone. Her muscles were so atrophied that all her knowledge of hand-to-hand fighting was worthless -- she was, in a very real sense, at the world’s mercy. Now, though, sitting behind the wheel of a massive van, she finally felt like she could _do_ something -- even if that something consisted of running other cars off the road.

Her grin was absolutely savage as she wove around the bus, gunning the accelerator until she could shift up to fourth. Given that she wasn’t on a highway, she really shouldn’t do that, but she didn’t care. They’d just busted six people out of whatever France’s equivalent of the CIA was: her erratic driving was nothing compared to that. Okay, so she didn’t quite know where the _airport_ was, but that was just a minor detail.

Logan shoved himself back into his seat, and the expression of mild terror on his face almost made her lose it. “Left,” he croaked. “Up there, left.”

Left she went, tires squealing again, a symphony of horns surrounding them. There came even more screaming from the back, but she tuned it out. Some behind -- far behind -- sirens started screaming, too, but they didn’t matter, either. Thought and worry and fear had been left behind, replaced by a small voice in her head going _wheeeeeee!_ The consequences could be dealt with later.

\--

Everyone in the back of the second van was pretty damn unhappy, too. An unusually frazzled-looking Ororo had leapt into the passenger seat and confirmed their cargo had been grabbed -- and that they’d have to hurry, if they wanted to catch up with the others. Which was always the wrong thing to tell Raven, who could drive like a bat out of hell if she had to.

Clarice, green though she looked, had managed to keep her nausea in check, but Hank definitely hadn’t -- he’d been quite noisily sick all over the floor, leaving the rest of them to try to avoid it as the van jerked and bounced. Clarice was actually clinging to the back of the driver’s seat, head pressed against her right arm. Kitty was attempting to do the same thing on the passenger’s side, but was making a far worse job of it. 

Hank, unfortunately, had landed on his knees, right in the middle of his puddle of puke, but Erik felt no desire to help him -- he was far too busy trying to avoid it himself. Given that he had nothing to hang onto, that wasn’t an easy proposition.

“Hard left!” Raven cried -- all the warning they got before the van almost tipped over on its side. It made Hank sick again -- honestly, how could one person produce that much vomit? -- and it was all Erik could do not to land on his head.

Sirens wailed in the distance, but with Raven’s driving, he doubted they’d catch up before this circus reached the airport. At this point, even being trapped on that plane with six additional people was sounding attractive. He was probably going to be one gigantic bruise by the time they reached it.

“Ugh, stop the world,” Kitty grumbled. “I want to get off.”

Clarice lifted her face just long enough to say, “That’s what she said.”

Ororo choked, pressing a hand over her mouth, but it actually took Erik a moment to work it out. Wonderful. Because he needed another reminder that he was traveling with a herd of children.

“Can it,” Kitty groaned. “Crouton warfare can always get another target.”

“You don’t have any croutons,” Clarice pointed out.

“ _I’ll get some,_ ” Kitty snarled, and squeezed her eyes shut. “Seriously, are we there yet?”

“Almost,” Raven said, and she was actually trying to sound soothing. Erik found that vaguely worrisome. “Logan really does drive like a lunatic.”

“That’s not Logan,” Ororo said. “This you can blame on Rogue. Then again, I’m pretty sure he’s the one who taught her how to drive to begin with.”

“It’s effective,” Raven muttered, swerving around a panicked crowd of tourists. At least Marie had already cleared a path for them -- right through a chainlink fence, Erik noted. 

The plane, mercifully, was still there. The first van had skidded to a halt at the edge of the tarmac, doors flung open wide as it disgorged its unsteady passengers. Most of them looked as ill as Hank and Clarice -- but after a ride like _that_ , Erik couldn’t blame them.

Before their van even came to a full stop, he kicked open the doors and jumped out, drawing deep lungfuls of air blessedly untainted by the stink of vomit. He watched with slightly detached amusement as Logan gleefully menaced the most belligerent of their new companions. Marie looked torn between smacking him and simply rolling her eyes, but Charles looked...well, rather pained. It was an expression he’d been wearing more and more often the last few days.

Raven and Ororo hopped out to go help run herd on the newcomers, leaving the three at the back to stagger their way to freedom. Hank seemed to have thrown up everything he had to lose, and his complexion was no longer a sickly olive. Clarice, on the other hand, sicked up as soon as her eye-searing platform shoes hit the ground.

“This? This is why Vlad _stays in the closet,_ ” Kitty grumbled, trying to skirt the puke in the back of the van. She actually managed to get out without falling over, amazingly.

“I’ll get the plane started,” Hank groaned, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. The thought of him piloting an aircraft in his condition was more than a little alarming.

Erik turned his attention to the newcomers. Three men and three women, only one of whom looked over thirty-five: the man Logan was haranguing. Four looked like they could be related, all dark-haired, of medium height, with olive complexions and eyes so dark they looked black. The oldest man, on the other hand, was well over six feet tall, with carrot-red hair and blue eyes filled with abject terror, while the youngest woman was a pixie-like blonde who couldn’t have been more than seventeen. Ironically, she was the only one in the entire group who didn’t look ready to either flee or kill someone.

Erik rolled his eyes as he approached. Raven and Ororo were trying so desperately hard to reason with them, working entirely at cross-purposes from Logan, but there seemed to be a very distinct linguistics barrier: he heard snatches of French and English, and a great many words that didn’t belong to any language he knew of -- and given how many he spoke, that was saying a great deal.

He caught Hank’s eye, and the other man just shook his head, evading them all as he went to the plane. Behind him, Clarice was very noisily sick again.

“Will you all just _SHUT UP!_ ”

Erik blinked -- that had been _Charles_. What was even more surprising was that the outburst actually had its intended effect: total silence fell.

“ _Thank_ you. Now, I don’t know just how much English you speak, but _we are trying to help you._ I would have thought that would have been obvious when we first rescued you. We need to just get on this plane and out of French airspace, and then I want to know just what the hell you’re doing here.”

They all stared at him, and five out of the six had looks of vague incomprehension on their faces. Only the little pixie girl seemed to have actually understood more than half of it, and she did what Erik presumed was rather rapid-fire translation.

“’Cause this is going to end well,” Kitty muttered, coming up beside him. She was trying to support Clarice, but since she couldn’t actually support _herself_ , it was something of a losing battle.

“I don’t think it’s going to ever _end_ at all,” he snorted, mostly to himself. The plane’s engine came to life with a deep, groaning whirr, making their new guests jump.

“Up the steps,” Charles said. “All of you.”

There was some more hurried conversation. “You first,” the blonde girl said.

Charles paused, looking poised to say something, but gave up. Logan helped manhandle him and his wheelchair up into the plane, which seemed to earn at least a little trust. The rest of them followed, collectively uncertain, like timid animals. Just how far back in time had they come? The way they reacted would suggest almost nothing was familiar to them. At least the first group of clowns could actually function in 1973.

Light flashed at the corner of his eye, and a cacophony of sirens broke out in unison. Over a dozen black-and-white police cars were approaching the tarmac, and it looked like there were even more in the distance. 

“Uh-oh.” Clarice tried to run and drag Kitty at the same time, which looked somewhat ridiculous, given that Clarice actually wasn’t a great deal taller than her friend. Kitty herself was still fumbling with the cane, which really was far too big for her -- it came halfway up her ribcage, which made it impractical as anything other than a crutch. Or possibly a club.

“Oh, for God’s sake. If you stop to vomit, I’m leaving you,” he said to Clarice, even as he grabbed Kitty and hoisted her over his shoulder. 

“First Logan, now you,” she grumbled. “I am not a goddamn sack of potatoes!”

“No,” he agreed, with almost vicious geniality. “You’re far too small. Keep up, Clarice.” He knew that if he left the nauseated girl behind, Charles would make him pay, but that didn’t mean he liked it.

Fortunately, she did keep up, and even managed to make it up the stairs under her own steam, though she paused to throw up onto the tarmac one more time.

“Here, catch this,” Erik said, tossing Kitty at Logan. She yelped, but at least she was caught, and deposited in one of the seats surprisingly gently. That didn’t stop her giving Erik an absolutely venomous glare, though.

“You are so lucky I don’t have any spiders,” she said, and winced when one of the new people jostled her shoulder. “I don’t have nearly enough croutons for this shit.”

Erik, apparently wiser than most of the other people stuffed in this flying sardine can, wedged his way through and found a seat as well. He pulled a crumpled plastic package out of his pocket, ripped it open, rummaged through it -- and flicked a crouton at the red-haired man.

Kitty’s eyes widened. “ _Gimme_ ,” she hissed. “I swear, I’ll call cease-fire with you, but I need to throw something at someone.”

“Can I trust you?” he asked, as the plane started taxiing. 

“Under normal circumstances, no,” she said bluntly, “but right now? Now I’ve got plenty of more deserving targets. So _gimme_.”

\--

The speech barrier, Ororo reflected, was really the root of the problem. The small blonde girl was the only one who seemed to have half a clue, but she was trying to direct five other people who seemed determined to ignore her. Between the two of them, they managed to get most of her group seated, at least, though they all looked terrified when the plane took off. Were there no airplanes, in their future? The paper had said they carried very advanced technology, so surely there was still aircraft where and when they came from. 

Clarice, who had guzzled a bottle of tonic water she’d found in the fridge, had come to help, insofar as she could. Her face was pale, but at least it was no longer green. “Are we really taking these idiots to New York with us?” she asked, a little plaintively.

“They’re not idiots,” Ororo remonstrated. “They’re just completely out of their element. Logan being _Logan_ didn’t help, either.”

“You could say that again,” Rogue muttered, squeezing past. “We need to work on his interpersonal skills a little.”

“Logan?” the blonde girl asked. “Shout-ing man? Kick for us.”

Ororo opened her mouth to say something -- just what, she never did know, because before she could speak, a crouton bounced off her nose.

“Foul,” Kitty choked, trying to smother a fit of giggling in her sleeve. “Off sides.”

“You don’t know a thing about football, do you?” Magneto asked -- oh, wonderful. _He’d_ thrown the thing. And to think he somehow became a mature and dignified adult. Although, and this was a slightly horrifying thought, maybe Kitty was such a bad influence that this time, he never would. 

“Nope,” she said. “Aim for the redhead, not ’Ro’s nose. Your aim sucks.”

Ororo shut her eyes, carefully counting to ten. When she opened her eyes, she found Clarice staring at her, one eyebrow quirked. “I can’t decide if that’s cute or disturbing,” she said.

“What?”

“Those two. I mean, it _could_ be cute, if it wasn’t so damn creepy.”

“What’s creepy?” Kitty asked, lobbing another crouton. This one lodged itself in Clarice’s braid.

“And _I’m_ the one with bad aim?” Magneto said witheringly.

“Hey, I never said mine was any good. Yours is just worse.”

Clarice shook her head. “You two. I’m not sure if you’re cute or creepy.”

The identical blank looks she received were almost enough to make Ororo laugh. She could pinpoint the exact moment comprehension dawned, too.

“ _Ew_ , Clarice, are you _shitting_ me? I don’t want to know what made you think -- _gah_.” Kitty’s left eye was actually twitching. _Twitching._

Magneto actually seemed to be completely speechless. He somehow managed to look startled, disturbed, and absolutely murderous all at once, and Ororo was suddenly very worried for Clarice. His was an expression that promised vengeance.

“Well,” she said, a little lamely, “You do...you _aren’t_...?” She trailed off, having no idea how to actually finish that sentence.

“Oh Christ, Ororo, not you too. Is anybody _else_ totally, disgustingly mistaken?”

Magneto shot her a dirty look. “Disgusting?” he asked, offended.

“Dude, I know you when you’re like ninety. Seriously, I’m gonna smack the next person who says anything about -- yeah. No. _Wrong._ ”

“You so sure about that?” Rogue asked, dubious. “’Cause you could have fooled me. You fight like an old married couple.”

Kitty groaned. “Thanks, Rogue. I can’t hit _you_ \-- Logan would skewer me. Clarice, get over here. I’m going to cane you within an inch of your damn life.”

“Kinky,” Magneto muttered.

“ _You are not helping_ ,” she snarled, rounding on him, cane in hand. “Are you going to deal with this, or do I have to do it by myself?”

“Why bother now?” he asked, with a small smile that was absolutely evil. “As you’re so fond of saying, they have to sleep sometime. Let it wait until they’re not expecting it.”

It had been a while since Ororo had felt true fear, but that expression left her mildly but genuinely terrified.

“Are you kidding? When we land, they’ll run.” She grabbed another crouton and flung it at Clarice, who just barely dodged. “Seriously, Ororo? _Seriously?_ Clarice, yeah, she’s...well, she’s _her_ , but you? I thought you had better sense.”

“What, I don’t rate a mention?” Rogue asked, sounding stung.

“I can’t insult _you_ ,” Kitty said. “Again, Logan and claws -- but still, you should have known better. This is your fault, Clarice. All your fault. _All_ your fault.”

There was a dark, blatant threat in her voice, and Ororo honestly found it even more unsettling than Magneto’s smirk. 

“What is whose fault?” the blonde girl asked. She looked at Clarice, and then at Kitty and Magneto. “Did they break up?”

Kitty sputtered, red-faced and furious, and thunked her forehead on the table. “Ow.”

“Genius,” Magneto snorted. “No,” he said. “We are not a...thing. _Anything_. Well, perhaps crouton and arachnid enemies.”

That received a completely uncomprehending stare, but in this case, Ororo couldn’t blame her: that sentence barely made sense to _her_ , and she actually knew what he was talking about.

“Just wait,” Kitty muttered, sitting up and glowering. “Just you wait.”

Ororo, who had faced down countless enemies without flinching, who had spent the last few years successfully evading murderous Sentinels, shivered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Clarice. Poor, poor Clarice. She’s going to bear the brunt of this revenge scheme, though Ororo won’t get off light. Giving Kitty and Magneto a common enemy is a bad, _bad_ idea.


	14. Flight of the Damned

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This long chapter is even longer than the last long chapter. If that makes any sense. In which there is much exhaustion, a little crouton warfare, and the beginnings of some well-founded paranoia on several fronts.

Now that the adrenaline was wearing off, Marie was tired as hell. Once upon a time, that wouldn’t have fazed her, but she was still so out-of-condition from all that damn time in the camps, and all she wanted to do was nap. It wouldn’t exactly be fair to the others, though, when they were all -- mostly all -- trying so hard to actually communicate with their new...guests. Kitty and Magneto appeared to each be off in their own worlds, plotting murder. As far as she was concerned, they were just protesting too much.

She took a seat next to Ororo (who kept darting nervous glances at the furious pair), inspecting their fellow time-travelers. Most of them looked as tired as she felt, and she wondered just what the French “authorities” had done to them.

They had food now, at least, although the remnants of the mini-fridge weren’t going to go far. Ororo, unsurprisingly, had had to eat a little of it herself, to show it wasn’t poisoned, and Marie drank some of the water. She wanted to check them for injuries, but they probably wouldn’t want strangers touching them just yet. There were a few bruises, but nothing worse was visible.

_Of course not,_ she thought, a little bitterly, _they weren’t there long enough for the_ really _nasty shit_. Wouldn’t want to damage the captives right away, after all. Not before they’d given up some information.

The two dark-haired girls had fallen asleep, curled up with their heads together. Though they had to be in their twenties, they looked so _young_. Young and far too thin, though not as close to emaciation as she herself. One had a long scar running the entire length of her face, and the other looked like she’d had a second-degree burn on her neck. One of the men was almost sacked out as well, but the other, the one that looked like his twin, was staring at Marie with unveiled hostility. 

“Trust me,” she said, though she had no idea if he’d understand her, “you’ll thank us later.”

His expression suggested that was not likely, but whatever. He could sulk all he liked, until they reached the mansion.

The little blonde girl, the only one who seemed to understand more than half of what was said, tapped her arm. “Safe?” she asked, sounding like she didn’t want to believe it. Given how they’d been rescued, Marie supposed she couldn’t blame her.

“Safe. You’re going to our home.” She didn’t want to go into the time travel tenses involved, since, honestly, the thought gave _her_ a headache. “Some of us came from the future, too. Just not as far forward as you.”

The girl was quiet a moment, probably trying to translate that in her head. Marie could tell when it clicked, because her eyes widened. “Sentinels?” she said.

“Yeah. The first time, since I guess there’s another war. Did you get sent back for Trask?”

Again, another pause, but eventually she nodded. “Did you kill him?”

Marie shook her head. “No. We drugged him and dropped him off in Paris. He won’t get what he wants, now, ’cause I’m not sure he’ll want it anymore.”

That earned her a blank look, but that was rather understandable, considering how badly mangled that sentence was. “Nevermind. Point is, you’re safe, and you’re gonna be safe where we’re goin’. Were ya’ll just gonna stay back here, or were you goin’ home when you were done?”

It had to be the accent, Marie thought. The girl didn’t seem to have this much difficulty understanding Ororo. “Anyway, just rest. You hurt, any of you? Injured?”

The girl hesitated. “Bruised. And my leg.” She pulled up the leg of her grey prison-pants, revealing a rather ugly laceration that probably needed a stitch or two. “Accident,” she said. 

Marie wasn’t quite so convinced, but if she wanted to play it that way, it was her business. “Kitty, I need you take a few minutes away from plannin’ how to murder Clarice,” she said. “You’re still our team medic.”

Kitty visibly twitched as she snapped out of whatever elaborate revenge she was spinning in her mind. She hauled herself out of her seat and hobbled over, wincing when she saw the girl’s leg.

“Ouch. Rogue, can you get the first aid kit? If I tried to walk through here I’d probably break my neck. Shut up,” she added, glaring at Magneto.

“I didn’t say anything,” he said, attempting innocence and failing. Badly.

“You didn’t need to. Here, let me see that.” She knelt down, somewhat awkwardly. “Need to wash this out,” she called to Marie. “I can bandage it up for now, but it’s going to need a real doctor to look at it later. And probably a tetanus shot.”

_Great_. “Do what you can. We’ve got seven hours to come up with a better plan.” She left Kitty to it, detouring to grab and deliver the first aid kit, then creeping up the aisle toward the cockpit, trying not to step on anyone. The Professor had shut himself in with Hank, but Logan was lurking by the door, no doubt listening for whatever might be said between them.

“Bad?” she asked, figuring he’d know what she meant. The Professor had to have seen at least some of what lay in their heads, and if their future was anything like the one she and Logan had come from...well. This Professor didn’t have the weight of experience to fortify himself against that much horror. 

Logan nodded. “Think he just needs some time,” he said. “We were bad enough, and now there’s these guys. Gotta keep in mind, a few days ago he was a drug-addicted recluse. Think this might all be just a bit much.”

Marie winced. She still knew nothing of what had happened before Logan almost ran her over -- how long he’d been in the past, and just what he, Hank, and the Professor had been up to. There hadn’t exactly been a chance to ask.

“Still think we shoulda killed Trask,” Logan muttered. “I know the Professor -- our Professor -- said we shouldn’t, but still...as long’s that little bastard’s alive, there’s a chance he’ll finish cookin’ up the Sentinels.”

“He’s got to have had his reasons,” she said. “And, like Ororo said, so far as he knows, he got kidnapped by some crazy humans. Once the acid wears off, that’s all he’s gonna think about.”

Logan snorted. “True. And if these guys really are human, he doesn’t even have that to go off of. It ain’t like we don’t have our own shit to worry about, anyway. We can hack it, livin’ in 1973, but those goons? From everythin’ I’ve seen, not a chance. They must have come back a helluva long time.”

“They’re not goons,” she scolded. “They’re kids, most of ’em, and they’re scared. How would you react, if some strangers came in and dragged you out, just to stuff you in another van? Don’t tell me you wouldn’t punch someone, too.”

He had the grace to look slightly abashed. “Guess you’re right,” he said, a little grudgingly. “You usually are, and I don’t admit that to just anyone.”

His words warmed her more than anything had in a very long time. She was about to say so, but Clarice scurried over to join them, pale-faced and wild-eyed. “They’re planning something,” she hissed. “I know it. I’m sticking with you until I can find somewhere to hide.”

Marie grimaced in sympathy, but Logan just looked bewildered. “Who, what, and why?”

Clarice shuddered, but didn’t answer, so Marie did it for her. “She thought Kitty and Magneto were, you know, attached to each other in a creepy way, and made the mistake of sayin’ somethin’,” she said. “Now they’re both pissed and out for blood. ’Ro’s, too.”

He looked at Clarice like she’d grown a second head, and promptly ripped it off and stomped on it. “Why in _hell_ would you think that?” he demanded, incredulous.

She shifted from foot to foot, clearly uncomfortable. “You know, they bicker all the time,” she said vaguely. “And they’re always going after one another, to throw stuff. I figured it was like kids on the playground, or something.”

He shook his head. “Kid, if I thought that’d be a problem, I woulda said somethin’.” He tapped his nose, and Marie know what he meant, even if Clarice might be fuzzy on it. She tried not to think about the fact that he could smell...well, a lot of things most people wouldn’t want known.

“You’re sure?” Clarice said, dubious. “Because seriously. It wasn’t just me. ’Ro and Marie thought so, too, but neither of them is stupid enough to try to haze _her_. So they’re down to two targets, but honestly -- can you blame us? Really?”

Logan snorted. “I know you can’t smell shit like I do, but _seriously?_ They’re _somethin’_ , I’ll give you that one. They’re just not...that. You ask me, they both need a target, and until they got pissed at you, they were each other’s. Now you and ’Ro have that job. I’d say start plannin’ your funeral, but knowin’ them, they won’t kill you ’cause if you were dead, they couldn’t pick on you anymore.”

Clarice made a face. “That? _Really_ not helpful.”

“No, but it’s honest. If you’re smart, you’ll stick near the Professor. Neither of ’em’s dumb enough to pull any shit while he’s around.”

_I hope_ , Marie thought. Logan hadn’t seen their expressions. All things considered, she was damn glad she had him as a deterrent. Kitty had sometimes been a devious little critter even before she spent several years dodging Sentinels, and Magneto was...well, _him_. The thought of them working in tandem, rather than being pitted against each other...it didn’t bear thinking about.

Evidently, Clarice had come to the same conclusion, because she shuddered. “I’m going to go hide with the new guys,” she said. “I don’t think even Magneto would mess with them -- he’d know it would bring the Professor down on their heads.”

“Fair enough. I’ll throw somethin’ at you, if they look like they’ll do anythin’ stupid,” Marie promised. 

“Thanks,” she said, and scooted off.

Logan shook his head again. “To be honest, I _would_ worry, if Kitty didn’t look like she was twelve,” he said. “He was in prison a long time, if you catch my drift, but she looks like a damn kid, and she’s been actin’ like one, too.”

“Thanks for _that_ mental image,” she said dryly. “They’re creepy enough as it is.”

“Can’t argue with that,” he said. “Least they’re smart enough to stay away from you.”

“I know. It’s just...poor Clarice and Ororo. _So_ not gonna end well.”

He gave her shoulder a light squeeze. “That’s their problem. We’ve got enough of our own.”

_That_ was certainly true enough.

\--

Remarkably, the rest of the flight progressed without any major incidents, but Ororo did not find that at all comforting. It just meant there was Plotting going on, with a capital P. The newcomers eventually fell asleep, and as time wore on, their own people started nodding off, one by one. 

Logan and Rogue had taken up the “corner”, insofar as there was one, where the fuselage met the wall to the cockpit. Apparently having them near for protection was enough to give Clarice at least some security, because dared take a nap. It probably helped that Kitty had gone to sleep herself, thus reducing the immediate danger by half. 

Magneto, however, was wide awake, and appeared to be lost in thought. Ororo wasn’t quite sure why the thought of their retribution unnerved her so much -- no matter how angry Kitty was, she would never actually _hurt_ any of them. And while Magneto probably would, he was smart enough to know he’d incur the wrath of the Professor if he did. Except...there were myriad ways to psychologically torment someone that wouldn’t require any physical contact at all. It would probably be best if she and Clarice took rooms near Logan and Marie, in the hope that their presence would somehow act as a ward against dual, vindictive evil.

She glanced down the cabin. Raven was still awake, reading a book she’d nabbed from God knew where -- Ororo wasn’t surprised she wouldn’t sleep around so many strangers. It was rare that she wasn’t almost hyper-vigilant.

Ororo wondered, yet again, just what the hell had been in that box -- the bomb that wasn’t a normal bomb. Would they ever hear about what happened to it, what it did? How had Hank and Raven known to make it? Sooner or later, she’d have to ask

_Did it take anything from the house with it?_

She shivered. _That_ was a slightly horrifying thought. Why would she think it? Because the bomb had been made from things already in the house? Though it was very far behind them now, her skin still crawled at the memory of it.

Glancing at Clarice, she saw the girl was twitching slightly, frowning in her sleep. Clarice had actually gone down into that basement, had been directly exposed to...whatever was there. Even asleep, her face had gone grey with terror.

Rogue must have noticed it, too. She poked Clarice on the shoulder, once, twice. “You’re dreamin’, sugar,” she said gently. “C’mon, wake up. Nothin’ to be scared of.”

She couldn’t see Logan’s expression, but Ororo could; while it was often hard to read him, in this instance his eyes seemed to say that actually, there _was_ in fact something to be afraid of. Had his feral senses picked up something the others hadn’t noticed?

_I hope not_. All things considered, she was very glad that the New York mansion didn’t have a basement so much as an underground garage. And that there was an ocean and three thousand miles between it and France.

Clarice blinked, and made a little sound very like a whimper. Rogue gave her shoulder a slight squeeze. “C’mon, wake up. You’re with this flyin’ circus, not back...there.” Trust Rogue to intuit the source of Clarice’s nightmare. Then again, what else had they encountered here, that would be worthy of a nightmare?

Clarice shuddered, but she also smiled. “Flying circus is right,” she said. “I’d want a drink if I wasn’t still recovering from Vlad.”

It took Ororo a moment to work out what she actually meant, and when she had, she smothered a smile. Perhaps, if it became necessary, she could make the drink for their new arrivals. Whatever else it did, it certainly loosened people up.

\-- 

When Kitty finally woke up, it was dark outside the plane, and rather dim in it. Aside from Logan and Raven, she was also the only one awake. Clarice, in some ways at least wiser than she appeared, had gone to sleep next to Rogue; Ororo, equally intelligent, was napping beside Raven.

Kitty’s eyes narrowed. Were those two going to have allies in this war? Did she and Magneto need to worry about outside interference? Logan would probably just sit back and laugh, but she wasn’t so sure about Rogue and Raven. While Kitty knew what Rogue was capable of, and how she thought, Raven was an unknown. Aside, that was, from the fact that she seemed to be a complete badass. That could be...problematic.

_Deal with it later_ , she thought, levering herself to her feet. Her knee had stiffened up while she slept, her head felt like a tiny gnome was pounding on her brain with a sledgehammer, and her ribs were practically on fire. She needed a sandwich and a painkiller, ASAP. 

Between her walking stick/cane and some creative, one-footed hopping, she actually managed to get to the back of the plane without stepping on anyone. “Please, please tell me there’s aspirin or something,” she whispered to Raven, almost plaintively. “Right now I kind of wish I was dead.”

Raven snorted. “Don’t say that,” she said quietly. “It’s tempting fate. And if there wasn’t any aspirin in the first aid kit, I don’t think there’s any on the plane. There _is_ some leftover vodka in the fridge, though.”

Kitty had had more than enough of being drunk the last few days, but when weighed against the sheer amount of sore she was, booze won out. She hopped over to the mini-fridge and opened it as quietly as she could. “Are you going to protect Ororo from what’s coming?” she asked, taking a swig and grimacing. Vodka had never been her thing.

Raven’s eyebrows went up. “You mean, your revenge? That’s not really my job. Besides, I thought she was r --”

“Don’t say it,” Kitty cut her off, with a slight groan. “I don’t want to add you to the list, because I know I’d lose. I knew we were all some varying degree of insane, but there’s crazy, and then there’s _crazy._ Anyway, he started it.”

“Seriously?” Raven asked, clearly dubious.

“Seriously. He threw garlic bread at me after I got hit by a truck. He definitely started it.”

Raven blinked. “Maybe he went nuts in prison,” she said, shaking her head. “Just don’t drag all the new people into it.”

Kitty was downright affronted. “Hey, I might be vindictive, but I’m not a total asshole. Those poor bastards haven’t done anything to me -- and even if they had, they’re miserable enough as it is. I’m not sure how the hell they’re going to handle it, being in 1973. The technology’s a little primitive compared to what I grew up with, and the less said about the fashion, the better, but otherwise it’s not really that different. But if they spent their entire lives in the kind of crapsack future we came from...well, no wonder they seem freaked out by a plane ride. They might never be able to live away from the mansion.”

“You might have a hard time of it, too,” Raven pointed out. “Legally, you don’t exist. You’re going to need a lot of false paperwork. Way more than all my forged ID’s.”

Kitty grimaced. She’d thought of that, but only fleetingly. “Do you know anyone who could do that? I mean, right now I don’t really want to leave the mansion, but I might someday. I’d like the option, at least.”

“I have some people I can talk to.” She smirked a little when Kitty yawned. “Go get some more sleep. I think this is going to turn into a zoo, when we land.”

“You’re probably right,” Kitty grumbled. “And thanks -- I appreciate it. I mean it.”

Now Raven gave her an actual smile -- small, like all her smiles, but it was there nonetheless. “I know. Now go nap.”

Kitty accordingly hopped off. She hadn’t had much to drink, but at her size, a little was more than enough, and there was a precarious moment where she almost fell face-first onto the blonde girl.

Her balance almost gave out entirely when someone kicked her good leg. Somehow, she managed not to yelp, but it was a near thing. She turned, flailing a little, eyes searching the darkened cabin, and realized it was (of course) Magneto who’d kicked her.

Her first instinct was to whack him with her cane, before he saw it coming -- because seriously, they’d had a cease-fire, hadn’t they? -- but she realized he was asleep. Really asleep, not faking -- she’d learned, over all the years of Sentinel-dodging, how to tell when one of her companions was awake and worried. He was definitely out, and he was also definitely not happy. Nightmares? He’d been down in the basement with Logan, Hank, and Clarice.

“Dude.” She poked him with the cane, actually taking care not to just jab him in the ribs. “Wake up. You’re dreaming.”

Of course, he didn’t. He just frowned, trying to shove the cane away, nearly overbalancing her again in the process. Exasperated, she poked him harder. “You. Are. Dreeeaming,” she enunciated. “Wake the fuck up, or I’ll spit in your ear.” Poke. Poke.

His eyes abruptly snapped open, and he halfway lunged to his feet, but stopped when Kitty thwacked him on the shoulder. “Nightmare, dude,” she said. “Just a nightmare. There’s vodka in the fridge.”

He shook his head, rubbing his eyes. Even in the low light of the cabin, he looked like hell. This time, however, Kitty managed to stay diplomatic and not actually say anything about it. Satisfied that he wasn’t going to fall back asleep and kill someone, she hopped her way to her seat, sitting with a wince. “What was it?” she asked.

Magneto leaned foward, elbows rested on his knees, pinching the bridge of his nose. “What was what?”

“Your nightmare. Was it the basement?”

To her surprise, he actually shuddered. There was a thing she’d never thought she’d see. For a moment, she didn’t think he was going to answer. “Yes,” he said, eventually. “It was the basement. And that’s all I’m going to say.”

She actually managed to keep herself from pushing the subject, which was something of a minor miracle. “Vodka,” she reiterated, pointing at the fridge with her cane.

“I don’t need it.” He pulled a silver flask out of his pocket, unscrewed the cap, and downed what had to be half the contents at one go.

“You stole that from the Professor, didn’t you?” Kitty said with a smirk.

“I didn’t _steal_ it, I _borrowed_ it,” he said, a touch imperiously. “It’s not as though anyone else was using it.”

“True.” Had he brought it with them from the house? For some reason, the thought of having anything that had once belonged to that place with them was...unsettling. “But...if it came from the house, maybe when we land, you should lose it. Not sure how well any of us could sleep, knowing we had something from there still with us.”

He paused, eyeing it a little askance. She knew he woudn’t want to admit she might be right, and she was definitely certain he’d never _say_ so, but she didn’t really care. So long as he ditched the thing, he could think whatever he liked.

“So, what do we do about those two?” she asked, pointing from Clarice to Ororo. “I mean, I have some ideas, but this is supposed to be a joint effort. They’re smart enough that they’ll probably take every tiny bit of metal out of their rooms. None of us survived the Sentinels this long by being stupid. Shut up,” she added, seeing his expression.

“I wasn’t going to say anything,” he said, with an attempt at innocence that would have fooled absolutely no one.

“You didn’t need to,” she grumbled. “You’re easier to read than you think you are.”

“Says you,” he retorted, and she choked on a laugh. He sounded a little too much like Clarice. “I have...thoughts. I’ll have more once we reach the mansion, especially when we know where they’ll both sleep. Psychological warfare can be just as devastating as physical torment.”

Well, that was a very... _him_ thing to say. The worst part was that he was right. “One thing,” she said. “When Clarice has a nightmare like that -- like the one you just had -- I don’t want to fuck with her then.” She was pissed at Clarice, sure, but there was a difference between being vindictive and outright cruel.

He turned his head, looked her dead in the eye, and, said, very solemnly, “That’s what she said.”

\--

Logan, who had been dozing, woke to what sounded like a cat gacking up a hairball. When he opened his eyes, he discovered that, rather fittingly, the sound was coming from Kitty, who looked torn between hilarity and indignation. She seemed to be trying to keep quiet, so as not to wake anyone else, but she wasn’t doing a very good job of it.

He debated saying something, but he felt the plane start to descend. Great. They’d have to wake up all the goons pretty soon. (He didn’t care what Marie said; as far as he was concerned, they were goons, and would remain so until they gave him reason to think otherwise.)

Speaking of Marie, she’d fallen asleep with her head on his shoulder, and he gently shook her. “Wake up, darlin’,” he said. “We’re on our way down.”

She opened her eyes, sat up, and yawned. Her movements jostled Clarice, who jerked awake and automatically tensed.

“Nobody’s dead,” Logan assured her. Not yet, anyway: most of the goons seemed pretty inoffensive, but he’d love to clock that carrot-top bastard into next week. He just needed a reason.

“How’re we gonna get back to the mansion?” Marie asked. “Way too many of us for one car.”

“That’s the Professor’s problem. He could probably buy us each a unicorn that shoots rainbows out its ass.”

Marie coughed, and dissolved into a fit of giggling so loud it woke up the dark-haired girls. They looked at her warily, but it was hard to feel threatened by Marie when she was laughing.

“Sugar, the shit that sometimes comes outta your mouth,” she said, shaking her head. “There’s a mental image I’ll never get rid of.”

“Why would you want -- eep!” Clarice twitched, and scraped a soggy crouton off her face. It smelled like it had been soaked in booze.

Logan glanced at the Evil Duo, but both were studiously looking elsewhere. A startled yelp from the other end of the plane indicated they’d nailed Ororo as well. How had they managed that? Neither had moved. 

He picked up the crouton and sniffed, and suddenly it made sense. Actually, he almost had to respect the sheer deviousness behind it.

“What?” Marie asked.

“It’s full of metal shavings,” he said, holding it out to her. She grimaced, and made no move to take it.

“I’ll take your word for it,” she said. “Clarice, as much as I’d love to help you, you did sorta bring this on yourself.”

“Hey, you thought the same thing,” Clarice said indignantly, wiping at her face with her sleeve.

“Yeah, but I knew better than to say anythin’.”

“Still don’t know how any of you made that mistake to begin with,” Logan muttered.

Marie elbowed him. “We can’t all smell pheromones, you know. Though speakin’ of that, you still gettin’ anythin’ from Raven and Hank?”

Now he was the one who grimaced. “A little more than I’d like,” he said. “Sometimes these senses are a goddamn curse.”

Somehow, she managed not to laugh. “What about the new people?” she asked. “I don’t mean like _that_ , but just...well, anythin’ weird, that we don’t have.”

“Not much more than the obvious. They’re all pissed and scared and malnourished. There’s somethin’ chemical around ’em, but I smelled that in the place we grabbed ’em from. Doubt they brought that back from the future.”

“Huh. Wish it was easier to talk to ’em,” Marie said. “They might be less freaked out. Even the blonde kid’s got a hard time, and she’s the only one who seems to understand a damn thing.”

“Let the Professor talk to ’em,” he said. “They can show him what they can’t tell. He can tell us.”

“Honestly, I’m not so sure I want to know,” Clarice said. “I mean, our future’s bad enough.” She jumped, with another strange eep-ing noise. “Goddammit, you two!” she hissed, glaring at Kitty and Magneto while she tried to dig a crouton out of her ear.

“There are worse things than croutons,” Kitty said flatly.

Logan laughed before he could help it -- mostly at Clarice’s suddenly terrified expression, but also partly at Kitty. Consciously or not, she was mimicking Magneto’s speech patterns as closely as her higher voice would allow.

Marie must have noticed it, too, because she choked on a snicker and failed to contain it. “Kitty, all you’d need to be a supervillain is a long-haired white cat to pet.”

“Don’t say that,” Clarice whimpered. “I’d spend the rest of my life checking my shoes for hairballs before I put them on.”

To Logan’s (this time silent) amusement, Kitty looked thoughtful. She elbowed Magneto, who seemed occupied with flinging more soggy bread bits at Ororo. “How do you feel about adopting a cat?”

He blinked, but apparently the last few days had taught him to just roll with the weird non-sequiturs. He glanced at the rather petrified Clarice. “I’m not sure I’m ready to be a parent,” he deadpanned.

Marie burst into full-throated laughter, jolting the rest of the newcomers awake. While the two girls still looked uncertain, at least they weren’t afraid, which was more than could be said for the others.

“Don’t ask,” Logan said, looking at the blonde kid. “It’s a long story, and honestly, it doesn’t make that much sense even to us.”

She was quiet a moment, then turned to chatter at her companions. They relaxed -- mostly. He couldn’t really blame them for still being a little wary, especially with this group.

The plane touched down, taxiing to a stop so smooth that he figured Hank must have gotten over his hangover. Their disembarking, however, was a lot rougher, since Clarice was trying to stick to Marie like glue, and the goon squad seemed afraid to go back out into the open air. Logan remained behind, waiting to help get the Professor and his wheelchair out.

Hank opened the cabin door, looking indescribably weary. “Everyone still alive?” he asked, glancing around the empty plane.

“For now,” Logan said. “Professor, how are we gonna get everybody back to the mansion?”

The Professor gave him a small, almost beatific smile. “We’re taking a bus. And no, you are not driving.”

\--

Marie yawned, back cracking as she stretched. She had no idea what time it was, but the moon was well up, gilding the tarmac with a slight silvery sheen. It was still warm, the air humid and breathless, but she didn’t mind -- it was a tangible reminder that they were no longer in France.

Clarice was stuck to her like a second shadow, but that didn’t keep the croutons away -- one dropped right down the back of the poor girl’s shirt, while another lodged itself in her hair. After that she apparently gave up, because she portaled herself to the other end of the tarmac.

“You can run,” Kitty said, “but you can’t hide.”

“Exactly how long are you gonna keep this up?” Marie asked.

Kitty shrugged. “Until I feel like stopping. Don’t worry, Rogue -- we aren’t going to _hurt_ anyone. And I already put down that if she’s having nightmares from the house, she’s temporarily off-limits. She was actually in the basement, after all.”

Marie shivered. “Good.” She wasn’t looking forward to Logan’s nightmares -- and she knew he’d have them. He couldn’t stay awake forever. “Part of me wishes I knew what the hell was behind it all, and another part doesn’t ever wanna find out.” She had, however, an unfortunate feeling that sooner or later they would.

“I don’t even want to think about it. With all these people to deal with, none of us might have much time.”

“I hope you’re right.” Marie looked at Raven, who was talking to the blonde girl and gesturing at the bus -- probably trying to convince them that it was safe to ride. Her companions ran the gamut from nervous to mutinous. She just hoped that they wouldn’t all run away as soon as they’d reached the mansion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaand they have returned to America! Now they just need to figure out how to communicate with their new houseguests, and find out just what the hell happened in the far future. They’ll also get some idea of what’s happened to Trask.


	15. Fears, Matters of Trust, and Wild Forks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which there is a homecoming, some attempts at trust-building, nightmares, rogue forks (but not _Rogue_ forks), the revelation of Trask’s fate, and garlic-bombs.

The bus trip to the mansion took over an hour, and the only reason nobody wound up getting murdered was because most of them fell asleep again. 

Clarice herself didn’t dare -- nor would she, until they’d reached the mansion, and she could safely portal into a bedroom at random. The place was big enough that her current enemies would have a hard time finding her. If she kept doing that every night, she might be able to safely sleep.

She was still dog-tired, though, and the only way she managed to stay awake was by humming _The Wheels on the Bus go Round and Round_ under her breath. Of course Logan heard her, but all he gave her was an eye-roll and a slight shake of his head. Given that his shoulder was currently serving as a pillow for Rogue, he couldn’t really do much else.

Kitty wasn’t visible, which meant she was probably sleeping on one of the seats. Magneto _looked_ like he was asleep, but she didn’t trust it.

She didn’t really trust some of the new people, either. Oh, a few were very obviously out for the count, but the big redhead and the surly black-haired boy were still semi-alert. The tiny blonde had fallen asleep beside Raven, who she seemed to actually trust. That was a start, at least.

The bus stopped long enough for Logan to shove the gate open, and Clarice peered out the window. She’d never seen the mansion at night without at least a _few_ lights on, and the sight unnerved her. It reminded her too much of what they’d left behind in France.

 _This is the school,_ she reminded herself. Sure, it might be before her time, technically, but she’d spent most of her childhood here. There was nothing to be afraid of. Well, except for retribution, but there was nothing supernatural about _that_. 

Though she stuck to the middle of the group as they herded off the bus, she didn’t think she needed to. Magneto looked dead on his feet, and Kitty was limping so badly, even with her cane, that Clarice felt a little sorry for her. Then she remembered the soggy crouton that had lodged in her ear.

Up ahead of her, Raven was talking to the blonde girl. “It’s all right,” she said. “This is...home.” Clarice didn’t miss the slight pause. She knew Raven had lived here with the Professor, but she still didn’t know the full story. “It’s safe here. Nobody will come to take you away.”

The girl turned to the rest of her group, chattering away. Only rarely did Clarice recongize any words, but there were a few: did they all speak some separate, futuristic language, or had English simply evolved that much between then and now? According to the newspaper, at least one of them spoke some variation of French, too.

A few of them -- well, mostly Mister Redhead -- still looked at Raven with deep distrust, but apparently he didn’t want to argue while his people were so exhausted. 

The younger ones looked around the entrance with undisguised wonder, seemingly fascinated by all the wood. They touched the tables and walls with a reverence that was both endearing and oddly heartbreaking. It was obvious they’d never seen anything really beautiful before.

“If you all want to stay in one room, we can move some beds in,” Raven was saying. “That way you’ll know where all of you are.”

Once that had been translated, the red-headed man seemed (rather grudgingly) less hostile. Given enough evidence, Clarice hoped he’d eventually realize that they really didn’t mean any of his group harm.

“They say yes, please,” the blonde girl said, though Clarice had a feeling the ‘please’ was her own addition.

Raven gifted the girl with one of her rare smiles. “Logan, can we get your help?”

“Sure,” he grunted. While he didn’t sound at all gracious about it, he was really tired. “Marie, you want your old room, or mine?”

“Doubt either of ’em’s anythin’ like they were, but yours had a better view.”

“Go on, then. You look about ready to drop.”

Rogue rolled her eyes, but headed up the stairs, dragging her small duffel bag. How in the hell could they be that...well, domestically adorable? Logan was...Logan. Neither word was something _anyone_ was likely to associate with him. He’d probably shank anybody who tried, being Mister Big-Tough-And-Stoic. Yet he didn’t seem to be at all reticent to be affectionate with Rogue in front of other people. It was so sweet Clarice could almost puke -- or maybe that was the lingering hangover.

She backed away from the crowd, searching for Ororo. Once everything was settled, she’d portal Ororo with her, so they could both stake out bolt-holes. Maybe the two of them could form a plot of their own. Hell, they _had_ to, if they were going to survive with their sanity intact. Kitty was devious and Magneto was an asshole, but neither she nor Ororo were pushovers. Fight fire with fire, and all that. Or, fight croutons with...something.

Ororo was still outside, talking to the Professor. Kitty, damn her, was limping her way in -- surprisingly, though, the surly kid was trying to help her, even though he couldn’t understand a word of what was going on around him. Given that she really wasn’t fond of being touched by strangers, it wasn’t exactly going well, but at least she seemed to be making an effort to not be rude. 

Hank shuffled in behind her, red-eyed and still somewhat grey in the face, though by now it could be exhaustion as much as hangover. Behind _him_ , Magneto was glaring daggers at the surly boy.

Well.

 _That_ was interesting.

Oh, Logan had to be right. If anyone could tell about things like...that...it was him, but still. There was, it would seem, something weird going on there. Maybe she and Ororo could use it.

The Professor and Ororo finally made it in, and Clarice was oddly relieved when the door was shut and locked. It was _very_ odd -- what was there outside for them to fear? Maybe it was just because, though the mansion was not yet the school, it was still the first place she’d ever felt truly safe in as a child.

She sidled up to Ororo. “Come on,” she whispered.

Ororo, bless her, seemed to understand immediately. They tiptoed down the right hallway and around the corner, and Clarice threw out a portal. It led to one of the furthest wings from the entrance, and probably well away from anywhere the others might venture.

The beds weren’t made up, but she didn’t care. She collapsed onto the fat feather mattress, and was out almost before her head hit the pillow.

\--

Marie was sound asleep when Logan finally made it up to his -- their -- room. She stirred briefly when he crawled up beside her, but was dead to the world again within moments.

Their sleeping arrangements were, by sheer necessity, somewhat unusual. She got all the blankets, and they both wore long-sleeved shirts -- hers had started out as one of his, and could have passed for a dress on her. As much as he wished he could actually _touch_ her, this was definitely better than nothing. For now, at least, having her close was enough.

 _The darkness had him again -- crushing, suffocating, pressing against him like a solid force. There was something with him down here, something he could neither smell nor hear, couldn’t taste or feel, but it was_ there, _and it was_ alive, _some malevolent intelligence that watched him flounder in the black._

_He tried to call for the others -- Hank, Clarice, even Magneto -- but his voice was nowhere to be found. His skin prickled, and his claws poked at the webbing of skin between his fingers._

_What was it?_ Where _was it? The darkness was gripping him like a vice, grinding his bones against each other, silent and insidious as it worked its way into his eyes, his ears, creeping down his throat with every breath --_

_Something touched his shoulder_

His eyes snapped open, and he threw himself away from Marie on sheer instinct as his claws extended. It had been her hand that touched him; it was still half-raised. Her sleep-fogged eyes were wide and concerned.

“Nightmare?” she asked.

“Yeah. Basement,” he said, hauling himself up off the floor. Dawn was tinting the eastern sky pink -- he might as well just get up. “Go back to sleep, darlin’. I’m gonna go see if the Professor’s got any coffee in this place.”

She looked like she wanted to protest, but she was Marie, and she knew him well enough to know when there was no point. “No beer for breakfast,” she ordered, and curled up under the blankets again.

“Fine,” he said. “But only ’cause it’s you askin’.”

“Not askin’,” she grunted, sounding very like him.

He shook his head, trying to shake away the lingering horror with it. It had felt so damn _real_. His heart was still jackhammering in his chest, his nerves fizzling with adrenaline. He’d promised Marie he wouldn’t have beer for breakfast, but vodka was open season.

Traversing the hallways was...weird. They looked much the same as they had when he’d lived here, but they were so _empty_. When school was in session, even early in the morning there were a few kids up and about -- the ones that liked to eat breakfast with a little privacy, or just walk around outside. There was that kid that never slept, and changed TV channels by blinking -- what was his name? Logan was somewhat disturbed to find he couldn’t remember.

In any event, it was silent now in a way it had never been in the future. Would never be. Whatever. While that was probably a good thing, considering the damn zoo it currently had living in it, it was still weird as hell.

He was rather surprised to find that the kitchen wasn’t empty, even at this hour. Hank and Magneto both sat at the long kitchen table, each clutching a cup of coffee -- the former just looked exhausted, but the latter looked even more ready to murder someone than usual. They both smelled like adrenaline and terror, too.

“Nightmares,” he said, pouring himself a cup from the pot. It wasn’t a question.

Magneto said nothing -- surprise, surprise -- but Hank nodded. “Basement. If I keep having dreams like that, I don’t know if I’ll ever sleep again.” 

“You get used to ’em,” Logan said, taking a large swig of coffee. “Nightmares. Eventually.”

“No you don’t,” Magneto said. He sounded like he’d swallowed a pound of gravel. “Not all of them. Not like these.”

Clarice, pale and wan, tiptoed into the kitchen, but froze when she saw Magneto. He glanced up at her, took in her expression, and sighed.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “Post-nightmare, you’re off limits.” He sounded incredibly disappointed about it, too. That had to be Kitty’s doing, because Logan was damn sure he wouldn’t let that stop him otherwise.

She breathed an audible sigh of relief, and went to rummage through the cupboards.

“What were they?” Logan asked, dragging a chair over. “The nightmares -- what happened in the basement?”

Hank shuddered, but said nothing. “Darkness,” Magneto said, and Logan was genuinely surprised he’d answered. “Something was alive in it, something hunting me. None of you were there.”

“Same here,” Clarice said. “It was watching, and then it...grabbed me. Kind of. It was like...like it crawled into my lungs.”

That was downright disturbing. “I know what you mean,” Logan grunted. “We need to tell the Professor. Us all havin’ the same dream just shouldn’t happen.” Under any other circumstances, with any other nightmare, he’d write it off as coicidence, as them all having undergone something shitty at the same time. But this...no, he couldn’t just ignore it.

Nobody agreed, but nobody disagreed, either. They just sat and went through far too much coffee, while the sun rose and painted the room pink and gold.

Eventually, the tiny blonde girl padded into the kitchen, her eyes darting fervently around the room. She froze when she saw them.

“Hungry?” Hank asked. She nodded, her eyes wide. “There’s food in the fridge and the cupboards.”

She gave him a blank look, so he stood, a little unsteadily, and went to the refrigerator. When he opened the door, she stared at it, as though she’d never seen one before. Maybe she hadn’t. “Take whatever you want upstairs,” he said, “if any of you don’t want to come down. They don’t _have_ to stay in the room, though -- you can go around the house.”

“Thank you,” she said, after a moment of processing. She filled a laundry hamper with plates, jars of jam, and two loaves of bread, before scurrying off.

Logan shook his head. Poor kid. He had to feel sorry for her -- for most of them, now that he didn’t have to try herding them like cats. That redheaded asshole, and the bastard boy, not so much, but the others just seemed so damn _lost_ that it was hard to stay angry at them.

Clarice downed the rest of her coffee. “I need a walk,” she said abruptly. “I need sunshine. Can you please just hold off on croutons or anything, until after lunch?” she asked, almost plaintively.

“I’m quite certain Kitty would strangle me if I didn’t,” Magneto said. “We still have Ororo. Go wake up.”

“Thanks.” She opened the French doors and stepped out onto the patio, looking around the yard, before she threw out a portal and hopped through it.

“You actually gonna hold to that?” Logan asked.

“If I didn’t, the cease-fire would be invalidated before revenge was had,” Magneto said. “Besides, as I said, Ororo is still a fair target. Though I think a little creative retribution might take Clarice’s mind off...this.”

Logan would never admit it out loud, but he sort of had a point. The kind of shit Magneto and Kitty did was harmless -- annoying, but harmless, and being annoyed at having gooey bread thrown at you was better than being terrified of your own dreams. “Tell Kitty that,” he said. “See what she says. Clarice is still her friend, even if she’s pissed at her right now.”

“I’ll take that under advisement.” By which he probably meant, _I know you’re right, but I’m not going to give you the satisfaction of saying so._

“You do that. Hank, what time does the Professor usually wake up?”

Hank shrugged. “Whenever. Now that he’s not taking that...stuff, he might go back to getting up early.”

“I’m goin’ out later,” Logan said. “If he’s not up by the time I get back, I’m pokin’ him with a stick.” He meant it, too.

\--

While Ororo had no nightmares, she woke troubled. Nothing appeared to have been done to her room during the night -- thank God -- so she took some time to meditate before hopping in the shower. It had been so long since a hot shower was anything but a luxury, and she stayed in rather longer than she needed to. What she really needed were some spare clothes.

When she left her room, she found the quietness of the house unsettling, but not in the way that the house in France had been. This was simply born of the fact that she’d known this place so well, so it was at once familiar and very different.

It was quite a walk to the main kitchen, but it was pretty, the sunlight through the windows casting golden squares on the floor. It was in need of a good sweeping, but it was the same dark granite as it had been in the school she’d lived in for so many years.

Raven joined her, popping out from a side-corridor with the stealth of a ghost. “No spiders?” she asked.

Ororo laughed. “I think everyone was too tired, last night,” she said. “It’s tonight I’ll worry about. Have you seen our guests yet?”

“No. They’ll come out when they’re ready.”

“Or hungry.”

“That too. I need food myself.”

They walked on in companionable silence, and Ororo wondered again just who Raven actually was. The Professor obviously knew her very well, and she seemed to know her way around the house. Had she been dead, by the time Ororo first met him? If so, they’d better try to avert it this time around. 

The kitchen, by the time they got there, was rather crowded. The table was covered in empty cereal bowls, toast crumbs, and coffee-cups, and everybody save the Professor was gathered around the small TV on the counter. Well, it was small to Ororo’s eyes: for 1973, it was a decent-sized set.

“What are you watching?” Raven asked.

“Come see this,” Kitty said. “We just found out what happened to Trask.” She reached out and turned up the volume.

_“Doctor Bolivar Trask, who was publicly abducted on the first day of the Peace Accords, was discovered yesterday wandering the streets of Paris in an apparent state of intoxication.”_

Rogue burst out laughing. “That’s one way to put it.”

_“No word yet on who abducted him, or why. Witnesses report that he stripped to his undewear and began dancing in the Fontaine de l'Observatoire, singing Spanish folk songs. He attacked the police officers who attempted to apprehend him.”_

“Too bad camera phones don’t exist yet,” Logan muttered.

“Camera phones?” Hank asked, perking up a little.

“You’ll love ’em. Got another forty-odd years to go.”

Kitty choked. “Yeah, how about no,” she said. “I could definitely live without seeing that.”

“Seeing what?” The little blonde had crept into the kitchen like a shadow, followed by the four other young people in her group. The cranky redheaded man was, thankfully, nowhere to be seen.

“Check this out,” Kitty said. “Trask’s on the news. Well, what happened to him is.”

The five crowded around, peering over shoulders and around elbows. Somebody _had_ caught at least one picture of Trask: it was both grainy and blurred, but it was unmistakably him, waving a belligerent fist at a harassed-looking police officer, wrapped up in a police coat and looking like a drowned cat.

One of the girls burst out laughing, and immediately clapped a hand over her mouth, looking horrified.

“It’s okay,” Rogue said, looking at her with a knowing sort of sympathy. “You can laugh. It’s funny.”

“It’s fuckin’ hilarious,” Logan said. “Somebody’s gotta go to the grocery store soon, and it’s probably gonna be me, so make a list. Do any of you have names?” he asked, looking at the blonde.

She blinked, seemingly startled that he’d ask. “Anathea,” she said. “The girl on your left is Irena. Her sister is Lia, and her brother, Janek --” she pointed at the older boy, who had been so resistent to...well, everything yesterday. “Amal is their cousin. Alfred is still upstairs.”

“ _Alfred?_ ” Logan snorted. “Sorry. Just...kind of a weird name, here.”

Ororo knew what he was thinking. With the hair and rather prominent ears, the man really did look a little like Alfred E. Newman. His face would be right at home on the cover of _Mad Magazine_ \-- and, having thought that, she would never be able to un-think it. Thanks, Logan.

Unfortunately for her, she’d allowed herself to be distracted while in the same room as Kitty and Magneto. She didn’t realize her error until she shook her head, and discovered a fork had woven itself quite intricately into her hair. She glared at Magneto, who gave her an attempt at an angelic smile that was downright disturbing.

“You could set a trend,” he said blandly.

“I’ll eletrocute you,” she threatened, giving it an experimental tug. It wasn’t going to come out easily -- knowing Mangeto, she was probably going to have to sit in front of a mirror for hours, patiently prying it free strand by strand.

She didn’t know if it was the threat, the action, or both, but Kitty started laughing so hard she actually fell out of her chair. “Ow, motherfucker!”

“Tell me,” he said, shaking his head, “how _exactly_ have you survived a dystopian future so long?”

“What is it people used to say?” she grunted, hauling herself back upright. “The complete and utter madness of my skills. Thanks, dude, but I’ve got this,” she added to Janek, who was...well, hovering. He frowned, but he must have understood her, because he backed away. His sister -- Irena? -- glowered at him, though it was nothing compared to the glare _Magneto_ was aiming at him over Kitty’s head. It could have blistered paint.

Ororo blinked. Well then. Not interested, but apparently doesn’t want anyone _else_ interested, either. There had to be a way she and Clarice could use that.

Once she got the damn fork out of her hair.

Rogue sighed. “I’ll go with you, sugar,” she said, sounding a little strained. “Anathea, you want to go to the grocery store? Get a look at what life’s like in 1973?”

The girl jumped. “I...maybe? I need to ask --”

“Don’t say you’ve gotta ask _Alfred_ ,” Logan snorted. “This ain’t where you came from. Only person in charge here’s the Professor. _Alfred_ can’t tell you to do shit.”

It took her a good thirty seconds to translate that. “I think word is...okay?”

Rogue grinned. “It’s a good one. We’re gonna need to get everybody more clothes, sooner or later.”

“There are some things here,” Hank said. “Clothing students left. Not a lot, but it’s better than nothing.”

“That it is,” Rogue said. “The rest of you...explore, okay? Get some sun. It’s actually safe to be outside, in this time.”

Anathea smiled. She was a pretty girl, when she didn’t look so deathly serious. “Should I get my shoe?”

“Shoes,” Rogue corrected. “Yeah. We probably better do this before it gets too hot outside.”

“You kids have fun,” Ororo said, and shot Clarice a significant look. “I’m going to go deal with this _thing_.” She touched the fork again, already planning revenge. 

“I’ll help,” Clarice said. “I’m sure we can do something about this.” Ororo at least knew she meant more than one thing.

\--

Her leg being what it was, Kitty wasn’t physically capable of searching the entire mansion for Ororo’s and Clarice’s rooms. Fortunately, she knew them both very well.

They’d head for the outermost wing, she was sure, but they wouldn’t take rooms at the _very_ end, and they wouldn’t be next to one another. Clarice’s room at the school had been on the right side of the hallway, and Kitty would bet the one she’d picked would be, too. People were creatures of habit, whether or not they wanted to admit it.

Ororo she was slightly less sure of. She’d probably be on the right side as well, if for different reasons: the overhang of the rafters would make it easier to escape, if need be. As if that would help. Both she and Clarice had left the kitchen, but it was highly unlikely they would have gone to either of their rooms, so Kitty ought to have a little time to...set things up.

The fire in her ribs had actually woken her up at about four in the morning. When she’d hauled her sorry ass down to the kitchen for some aspirin, she’d hit upon what she considered a wonderfully horrible idea involving Saran Wrap, garlic, and dish soap. Done correctly, it would be the gift that kept on giving -- to half the wing, if she was lucky.

Accordingly, she’d dragged the necessary supplies back to her room, and spent the sunrise putting together her little presents. Really, they were extremely simple: wrap garlic and a dollop of soap in Saran Wrap, just tight enough to hold everything together. She’d stick them under the rugs in both rooms, where they wouldn’t release their stinky goodness until the pressure of a foot burst the wrapping. Of course she’d had to scrub the hell out of her hands afterward, to make sure none of the odor clung to _her_ , but it would be worth it.

Walking that far was simply not an option, but forunately for her, some departed student had left a skateboard on the floor of her room’s closet. For once, her size was an advantage rather than a liability, because it was easy enough to sit on it and scoot herself along with her hands, bag of goodies wrapped in a dish towel on her lap. Sure, she probably looked ridiculous, but oh well.

Off she went, zooming like a pro, only running over her fingers once or twice. Maybe three times, but who was counting? Not her, that’s who. As long as she didn’t actually break anyting, she was golden.

She zipped right past Magneto, who looked at the skateboard, her, and the towel in her lap. Skidding to a halt with her good foot, she removed the towel, held up her bag of goodies, and pressed a finger to her lips. “ _Shhh_. You’ll find out later. Trust me. Nice job with the fork, by the way, but I wouldn’t go outside for a while. Ororo really might try to zap you. We have to take counter-retaliation into consideration.”

“They wouldn’t dare,” he said, though he didn’t sound like he quite believed it.

Kitty snorted. “You don’t know them like I do. Normally, I’d say Ororo was too dignified to pull any actual shit, but you never know. I don’t think they’re going to get any outside help, but they could be bad enough on their own. You have anything more planned?”

He looked thoughtful. “Possibly,” he said. “Is anyone else staying in their wing?”

“Dunno yet. Probably not -- they’d try to get as far away from everyone else as possible. Wouldn’t trust us to behave even if they stayed around the others.”

“Smart,” he said, a little grudgingly. “Though it also makes things easier. I doubt we could get away with bringing anyone else into it.”

“Probably not. I’ll scout the wing, while I’m at it.”

“Have fun,” he said, sounding a bit dubious.

“Oh, I will. Trust me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shit gets real, in waking and in dreaming. I may or may not have actually done the garlic thing to someone, when I was young and slightly evil. I can attest to the fact that it does indeed work, and the results are not only stinky -- they linger. Poor Clarice and Ororo.


	16. Field Trips, History, and Medicine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which uncomfortable information is discovered, medicine happens, further warfare is conducted, and the household attempts to coexist. (Emphasis on 'attempts'.)

Before they left for the grocery store, Marie hit on a rather clever idea. When she relayed it to Anathea, speaking as clearly as she could, the girl smiled.

While her companions completely failed at modern English, they could apparently all write. Marie gave each a pad of paper and a pen, and through Anathea’s translation, told them to write down the names they had for objects around the house. Marie’s group could then teach them the English equivalent, and they could work from there. It was a little bit like how she’d learned French, though it was going to be a much slower process. Rather than having a dictionary to work from, they were making one up as they went along.

Though Anathea was seventeen, taking her out into the world was like bringing a child with them. She looked at almost everything with total wonder, and Marie wondered, for the hundredth time, just what sort of hell she’d come from. Even the car was a source of fascination, though this time it seemed to be because of how primitive it was -- she rapped on the tires, and asked, in her broken way, why it didn’t float.

“Too early,” Marie said. “Way too early. The only thing in the air now are helicopters and airplanes -- the thing we got here in.” How could she be familiar with flying cars, but not with planes? They really needed to get past the language barrier with her, too.

The grocery store, when they reached it, was likewise a source of fascination. Canned food she seemed to be familiar with, as well as bread, but fresh apples seemed to stump her. Fish and packaged hamburger were also totally unidentifiable.

“You have these everywhere?” she asked, gesturing vaguely around her, and Marie suspected she was referring to the store itself.

“We do. Food isn’t a problem, in this time.” At least, not in America. She doubted Anathea was yet ready to be educated about third-world countries. In her own future, there wasn’t any disparity anymore, or even any real autonomous nations, and she doubted that had changed in Anathea’s time. Politics could wait.

The girl looked a little dubious at first, as though she thought Marie was lying. It might have been the other shoppers that convinced her, since they, like Marie and Logan, weren’t exactly amazed by so many groceries. “Trask ruin this,” she muttered.

“Ruined,” Marie corrected. “Past tense. It, uh, it means it won’t happen now, after what we did.” At least, she hoped not. She knew enough about human psychology to be reasonably sure that, despite the fact that Trask’s drugging was not his fault, it would be difficult for most people to take him seriously after the sight he’d presented on the news. He was hardly to blame for the fool he’d made of himself, and people would try to remind themselves of that, but subconsciously, the memory of that photograph would linger. Especially if there were more to be passed around, outside the official news stations.

The time period would also work in their favor, though it was terribly unfair. In 1973, little people were still the butt of many jokes, in a way they had not been in the years leading up to the Sentinel war. The thought made her wince -- the scorn they faced now was very like that which mutants would have to endure, when their existence became public knowledge. No matter how much she hated Trask, the thought of him being caricatured because of that sat very wrong with her. Mocking him for being a drugged-up asshole was one thing, but throwing in his physical appearance was cruel in a way she knew she’d never be able to stomach.

She was jolted out of her thoughts by Anathea, who tapped her arm and asked what they were supposed to trade, to be able to leave with all this stuff. This left her trying to explain the concept of money -- something that was slightly difficult, since it had been so long since she’d seen it herself. The girl seemed fascinated that things as useless as paper and metal could be traded for food, and she watched with avid interest as Logan paid.

“You think the mansion’ll still be there when we get back?” he asked, hefting paper sacks into the back of the car. He’d refused to let either her or Anathea help, claiming they were twigs that he didn’t want to snap in half. Marie made a face at him, mostly because he was sort of right.

“Too early for anyone to have burned it down,” she said, and almost laughed at Anathea’s shocked face. “It’s a joke,” she said. “Nobody’s burnin’ anythin’ down.” Well, none of their people. She wouldn’t put it past some of Anthea’s to light something up just because they didn’t know any better. She was hardly going to _say_ so, however.

\--

Errand done, Kitty was quite pleased with herself. She wheeled down to the kitchen for a late-morning snack and some more aspirin, trying not to cackle.

Hank, was drinking what had to be his fourth or fifth cup of coffee, eyed her closely as she hauled herself to her feet. “I want to look at your injuries,” he said. “Your leg and your ribs shouldn’t still be this bad, unless you’ve broken something.”

Her eyes narrowed. “How would you know about my ribs?” she asked. The leg, yeah, that was pretty damn obvious, and the bruise hadn’t quite faded off her forehead -- it was a rather sickly yellow now, but at least it no longer hurt to poke, but her ribs?

He rolled his eyes. “I might not be a doctor, but I was close, before the school shut down. You favor more than just your left leg.”

 _Great_. “You can bandage my ribs, right? I don’t think my leg’s broken. It doesn’t have the right bruising pattern.”

“I want to check anyway,” he said firmly, with a determination much like his older self. “If I have to, I’m sending you to the emergency room.”

She felt herself pale, the blood draining from her face. “And what happens when they test my blood and find out I’m a mutant?” she demanded.

Hank blinked. “They can _do_ that in the future?”

“You mean they can’t now?”

“Um, no. Not remotely.”

Kitty sighed. “Fine. But if I do go to the ER, what am I supposed to tell them? That I got hit by a car, but didn’t decide to do anything about it for a few days?”

“Well, it’s the truth. Yeah, it makes you look a little crazy, but...well, no offense, but you sort of are.”

She wanted to snap at him, but looking at everything she’d done since she got to 1973, he sort of had a point. She sighed again. At least she’d accomplished something this morning -- though if she had her leg put in a cast, it was going to make things much more difficult. “Fine. Let’s get this over with.”

He tried not to laugh as she wheeled herself out of the kitchen, but didn’t manage it. Kitty really couldn’t blame him, though, since she probably _did_ look totally ridiculous. “Have you looked over any of the new guys yet?” she asked.

“No,” Hank said. “I want to give them a little time to settle, before I start poking and prodding. None of them look like they’re badly injured, so waiting a little probably won’t hurt.”

Damn. If he’d had other people to worry about, he might not fuss over her so much. Oh well.

The makeshift infirmary came as a rather large shock. It was nothing like the one she’d grown up with: while it wasn’t dusty, it lacked almost everything it had held when she was at school. There was a long table covered in beakers and other weird scientific apparatus, and a few beds, but no real diagnostic machines, or even a proper medicine cabinet. Getting used to all the differences was probably going to take a while.

Hopping onto one of the beds wasn’t easy, but she’d had plenty of practice the last few days. Her leg wasn’t swollen in any way that would suggest an actual broken bone -- just rather spectacularly bruised. Her ribs, on the other hand -- she hadn’t paid much attention to them, since the leg was far more painful, but now that Hank was inspecting them, she realized that they looked a little misshapen. Huh. They hadn’t hurt _that_ bad.

He gave her a look of stern disapproval that was also very much like the Beast she knew in the future. “Why didn’t you say anything?” he demanded.

She shrugged. “I didn’t think I needed to. You have to understand, in the future, there aren’t any hospitals, and not a lot in the way of painkillers. What you get, you just...deal with. It’s that or die.”

The aggravation drained from his expression. “Oh,” he said quietly. “Still, you need a hospital. Once Logan and Rogue get back with the car, I’m taking you to the emergency room.’

Wonderful. This was just going to eat into her revenge time. At least she’d got _one_ thing done this morning -- she just hoped it wouldn’t be discovered before she got back. She wanted to witness the results firsthand.

\--

Logan really wasn’t quite sure what to make of Anathea. He was damn glad he Marie along, because he had no idea how to deal with someone that naive about the modern world. Well, the past, for all of them, but yeah. He knew what he meant, even if nobody else would get it. The girl was at once childlike and far too old for her years. 

At least she was the one who had even half a clue, and not _Alfred_. Given the way they all reacted, that asshole must have been the one in charge in the future. In a way, Logan couldn’t blame him for his assholery -- he _was_ basically the protector of these kids, and probably took his role seriously, but he had the bearing of someone who was a grade-A douchebag in general. It couldn’t all be laid down to protectiveness, especially since Anathea had seemed so uncertain about doing anything without his approval. When you lived in a wreck of a world, you had to be able to function on your own if you needed to, but she at least seemed totally dependent on his opinion, and the others probably were, too. It was a bad system, one they’d have to work on. And if he didn’t like it, he could go fuck himself.

Hank met them at the door, a thoroughly aggravated Kitty beside him, sitting on a...skateboard? He didn’t want to know. He really didn’t.

“I need to borrow the car,” Hank said, “and take her to the hospital. I think she has at least one broken rib.”

Logan snorted. “Kid, why the hell didn’t you say anythin’?”

“Save the lecture,” she said wearily. “I already had it.”

Considering this was Hank they were dealing with, she probably had. “All right. Lemme get all this crap outta the car, and I’ll go with you.”

“Me too,” Marie said.

Kitty groaned. “I appreciate it, guys, but I don’t need the whole circus. Really.”

“We shoulda noticed,” Marie said firmly. Logan knew that tone -- there was no arguing with it.

Apparently, Kitty knew it, too. She heaved a defeated sigh. “Fine. But somebody needs to keep an eye on Ororo and Clarice while we’re away. And no, we’re not bringing them with,” she added. “Clarice can’t go out in public anyway, unless she gets some makeup and hair dye.”

“Separate her and Ororo and they can’t plan,” Marie pointed out. 

“True,” she said, thoughtful. “And she wouldn’t expect Logan to behave without supervision. Fine, let her know, but don’t ask her to come or she won’t do it.”

“Clown car, here we come,” Logan muttered. Though at least the Professor’s car was a full-sized sedan -- nobody was going to be stuck sitting on someone else.

“ _I’m_ driving,” Hank said, just as firmly as Marie. “I’d like us to get there in one piece.”

Logan was pretty sure he’d drive like a granny, but whatever. It wasn’t like they needed a fast getaway or anything.

“Can I come, too?” Anathea asked. “I never see hospital.”

Logan wanted to say no, but it would be like kicking a puppy. “Okay. Just don’t talk much, or they might as questions. And whatever you do, don’t touch anythin’.”

She nodded. Her gigantic eyes -- so damn dark, compared to her hair -- were wide with an almost childlike glee. He hoped like hell he wasn’t going to regret this.

Marie had vanished with commendable stealth while they loaded Kitty into the car -- Hank was quite adamant she not bring the skateboard -- and returned shortly with Ororo. While the woman looked quite clean, she smelled very strongly of dust, and Logan wondered what the hell she’d been doing. She also had a scarf over her hair, suggesting she still hadn’t got the fork out of it. She immediately started lecturing Kitty, who let her head thunk back against the seat rest with a groan.

“I’ve already heard it,” she said. “Can we just get this over with?”

Logan really couldn’t blame her for being so irritated. He herded the rest of them into the car -- goddamn, it really was a squeeze -- and let Hank granny-drive them out to the street.

\--

Clarice was torn. No matter how obnoxious Kitty’s pranks might be, it didn’t seem fair to retaliate when she had broken ribs. That left Magneto the only target, but at least she had some ideas there. One of them was quite simple, but worthy of something Kitty might concoct.

She’d snagged a box of Ziploc bags from the kitchen, portaling up to her bathroom. There she spent quite a while carefully pouring a small amount of water into each. She sealed them, but only lightly, and squeezed one to make sure it would have the intended effect.

It exploded with a satisfying _goosh_ , and her resulting grin was damn near unholy. Once she’d made sure he wasn’t in his room, it was his turn. She was stuffing them all under the sheets on his bed, so he’d get a nice surprise when he went to go to sleep.

With a gleeful cackle, she headed into her room to grab a pillowcase to carry all her goodies in. As soon as she stepped on the throw-rug, something squished, and an extremely pungent stench of garlic wafted up from beneath her feet.

“God _dammit_ , Kitty!”

\--

By the time they reached the hospital, Kitty was deeply regretting letting Hank talk her into this. She was surrounded by an entire flock of mother hens -- even Anathea, who she'd only just met two days ago.

Hank went in and got a wheelchair -- a damn _wheelchair!_ \-- and made her sit in it. She’d liked her skateboard far better, thank you very much. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been this embarrassed, but judging by Logan’s expression, he’d duct-tape her to the thing if he had to.

The ER itself was much like they’d been in her own time, pre-Sentinels. Oh, the decor was absolutely hideous -- olive-green tile and walls that were a strange shade of mustard -- but it smelled like emergency rooms everywhere, a combination of disinfectant and the odd aroma produced by a lot of electrical appliances in one place. It was, however, relatively deserted, at least compared to what one would have been like in the future.

Hank went to talk to the triage nurse, and she drummed the heel of her good leg against the foot rest. Her mind wandered, preferring turning over prank ideas to acknowledging all the fussing going on around her. Honestly, Logan and Ororo should know better: they’d both witnessed far worse shit in the bad future. Rogue she could understand, since God knew what she’d seen in the camps, but those two? They knew she wasn’t made of glass, so she didn’t know what their problem was.

The garlic, she felt, was a good start. She felt a bit guilty about doing it to Ororo’s room, now that she’d come along for the ride to the hospital, but Clarice deserved it. Both would undoubtedly switch rooms, and finding their new ones would be much more difficult if she wound up with people watching her like hawk, ready for her to keel over if she sneezed -- which, she was sure, some of them would. Dammit.

She came back to herself when the chair started moving, and tensed. Kitty really, really, _really_ hated being touched by strangers -- Hank hadn’t exactly counted, since she knew his future self, but she didn’t know any of these doctors from Adam. And no matter what Hank said, part of her couldn’t help but be afraid they’d somehow be able to tell she was a mutant.

The doctor himself was a genial, white-haired older man, but her instinctive distrust remained. Hank must have told him some (edited) version of the story, because he shook his head. “Young people,” he said, producing a stethoscope as if by magic. “You’re not immortal, you know. I’m going to check your heartbeat.”

She tried not to tense as the cold metal pressed against her chest. It only half worked.

“Deep breath,” he said, and frowned when she winced as she did so. “I want to take some X-rays, but first I’d like to give you a painkiller.”

Rogue must have read the panic on her face. “It’s okay, Kitty. You mind if I stay with her? She’s sorta got a thing about hospitals.”

“You can’t be in the room,” he said. “But you can stand with the technician -- you’ll still be able to see each other through the window.” He paused. “Do you also have a thing about morphine?” he asked, looking at Kitty.

“Nope. _That_ I’m fine with.”

He smiled, and sent for a nurse, who set her up with a morphine drip with such businesslike efficiency that it wasn’t very unnerving. It only took a minute for it to kick in, and when she was loaded back into the wheelchair, she was quite at one with the world. This shit was even better than the Vicoden she’d eaten at the house in France -- ugh. _Don’t think about that, Kitty._

She felt like she was floating, so much so that she didn’t care about the X-rays, or the fact that she wound up being manipulated like a doll as the doctor showed Hank how to properly wrap her ribs with a heavy Ace bandage.

“The bad news is, she has two broken ribs,” the doctor said. “The good news is that she shouldn’t need surgery, so long as she’s careful. Keep her ribs bandaged, and apply ice every four to six hours. The leg has a bone bruise, but no fractures, and her skull is fine. I’ll prescribe some Vicoden before you leave.”

Kitty sighed. She already knew what Hank’s definition of ‘careful’ would be -- he wouldn’t want to let her move. That meant Magneto would have to bring her all her necessary...supplies, as well as plant the results all by himself. Considering he couldn’t walk through walls, that was going to make things difficult. Dammit. Maybe she could dragoon Rogue into helping. It was worth a shot, even if it probably wouldn’t work.

Sure enough, Hank had his Doctor Face on when they finally got her situated in the car again. “I’m putting you on bed rest for the next few days,” he said sternly, “and I will dope you to the gills, if that’s what it takes to keep you there.”

“I’ll take the skateboard,” Logan offered, ignoring her glare. “Sorry, Kitty, but this ain’t the future. Just because you could walk it off doesn’t mean you _should_ , if you don’t have to.”

That was...actually kind of sweet, though it was still damned inconvenient. “Fine,” she said. “I’ll try to behave.” It was the best they were going to get.

\--

Logan didn’t trust Kitty as far as Marie could throw her, but he knew Marie would keep an eye on her. And if she was busy making sure Kitty didn’t try to sneak stink bombs or something into Clarice’s room, he wouldn’t have to tell her -- at least not right away -- what he intended to talk to the Professor about.

He’d had nightmares for most of his adult life. By now, he and they were old friends, but last night...that had been another story entirely. It wasn’t the content of the dream, so much as the _feel_ of it. He’d had many vivid dreams, but nothing like that -- nothing so real he could practically taste it. There was darkness, and then there was _darkness_ , and what he and the other three had experienced last night definitely fell into the second category.

Hank _might_ go to the Professor, but Magneto sure as hell wouldn’t, and it was possible Clarice would just clam up. She’d spent too long in the future to do much else, since it wasn’t like anybody talked about their problems. No, it was down to Logan, and he wouldn’t bring it up to Marie until there was anything to actually tell. 

When they reached the house, Hank disappeared inside and came out with a spare wheelchair that belonged to the Professor. Logan probably shouldn’t be surprised he had a spare -- after all, if a wheel or something fucked up on the one he was using, he’d need another -- but surprised he was. 

Kitty sighed. “Right,” she said, allowing herself to be manhandled into it. She sounded so dejected that it was all he could do not to laugh.

He pulled Anathea aside. “Look,” he said. “Marie there is going to need help. Kitty won’t way to stay put in her room, and she’s good at sneaking out. Can you and your friends help?” It would give them a chance to see how medical shit worked in 1973, and maybe they’d get some English lessons out of it. Plus, it gave them something to _do_ , rather than just skitter around the house like freaked-out ghosts.

It took a moment, but she nodded. “You trust us?”

He snorted. “If you were gonna hurt anyone, I think you’d have already tried. Learn somethin’ while you’re at it.” 

“We will.”

He gave her bony shoulder a squeeze, and went off to find the Professor. This time of day he’d probably be in his office -- though whether he would be doing work, or just hiding from the masses remained to be seen.

Both girls and one of the boys from the new group were in the lobby, studiously writing down the names of everything around them. There was enough stuff in the mansion that they’d probably be occupied for the next week, and give the Professor some time to talk to Anathea. 

The fourth kid, the boy who seemed to have a really awkward thing for Kitty, was nowhere to be seen. Either he was off exploring on his own, or Magneto had murdered him and hidden the body while they were all away. While there was still definitely nothing like _that_ going on with either one of them, the son of a bitch reeked like jealousy, which didn’t make a goddamn lick of sense. Whatever _was_ going on, it was weird and creepy and Logan didn’t even want to think about it.

The Professor was indeed in his study, several huge, rather old books open on the desk in front of him. He looked rather troubled.

Logan knocked on the door frame. “Professor, you got a minute?”

“This is about the house,” he said, looking up, “isn’t it?” He probably hadn’t needed to read Logan’s mind to figure that one out.

“Yeah. Nightmares. Just us that went into the basement, though.”

The Professor sighed. “Come in, Logan, and shut the door. I might have an explanation.”

Logan did as asked, pulling up a chair and eyeing the books. Two of them looked like encyclopedias, but the third was handwritten. “What’s that?”

“My father’s diary. Well, his _other_ diary, the one he kept hidden. I think I know at least part of what went on in the basement.”

“Oh?”

The Professor brushed his fingertips over the paper. “I never knew my grandfather,” he said. “My father never talked about him, and I’d always assumed he died before I was born. He had, but not of natural causes.” He flipped through the pages, though he didn’t pause to read. “He was a mutant, like me. Of course, back then next to nothing was known about genetics -- all he did know was that he was different, and unlike me, he didn’t find any other mutants until he was an adult. By then, his telepathy had driven him half-mad.”

“What happened when he found another mutant?” Logan asked, already not liking where this was going.

“He experimented on her,” the Professor said brokenly. “He tortured her to death, and then he found another, and another after that. By the time my father worked out what was happening, he’d killed seventeen people, and buried them all in the basement. He attacked my father, and was killed in the fight. Knowing there was no reasonable way to explain it that wouldn’t damn him as well, my father did the only thing he could -- buried my grandfather in the basement, and sealed it off.” He shook his head. “How he could have taken me there as a child, I don’t know. I do know that I never felt anything strange, until Trask opened the basement door.”

Well, that was...creepy as all fuck. “So what, it’s haunted?”

The Professor shook his head. “No. I don’t believe in ghosts. But sometimes -- and I’m sure Erik would tell you this, if you could ever get him to talk about his time in the concentration camp -- sometimes the evil that’s done in a place can...linger. I’ve read that, to this day, animals won’t go near Auschwitz or Bergen-Belsen. It can...seep into the walls, in a way that has little to do with anything supernatural. I think that in this case, it created a kind of genius loci.”

“The hell is that?” Logan asked. He was beginning to regret coming here. As much as he wanted to write it all off as a load of crap, there was no denying the force of his nightmare.

“A place with its own sentience -- an ability to think,” the Professor clarified. “You disturbed it, you four and Trask.”

“You think he’s havin’ nightmares, too?” That would be somewhat poetic justice. 

“Possibly. Since he’s not a mutant, I can’t be sure without looking into his mind. They worry me, the nightmares -- I could feel them, all the way in my own room. If they’re even half as bad as what I felt would suggest, I have to wonder if you somehow brought a thread of that malevolence with you.”

Oh, how Logan wished he could say that was a ton of shit and actually mean it. “So what the hell do we do?”

“I’d like to take a look at your mind. If I can find the thread, perhaps I’ll know what to do about it.”

Logan didn’t like that thought at all, but if it would help, he supposed he didn’t have much choice. “So when do you want to do it? Now?”

The Professor shook his head. “No. As much as I’m sure you don’t want to hear this, I want to wait until you’ve had another nightmare -- I want to see your thoughts when it’s still fresh in them.”

No, he really _didn’t_ like that, but he wasn’t going to be a pussy about it. What choice did he have? “If tonight’s anythin’ like last night, I’m gonna be knockin’ on your door at four in the mornin’,” he warned.

“I’ll set my alarm. And Logan? Try to talk Clarice into coming to see me, too. I ought to be able to talk Hank around, and I’d rather have more than one mind to look into. I know Erik would never allow it, even if I had any desire to go into his head. The three of you should be enough.”

“I’ll give it a shot. I might not be able to convince her right away, but I can probably get her in here sooner or later.” This might not be the Professor she was familiar with, but he was still the same man, underneath all that hair. And if her nightmare really had been identical to Logan’s own, she wouldn’t be able to handle too many nights of it.

\--

“Rogue, I am not eating dinner in bed. I won’t do it. Stick me in the wheelchair if you have to, but I’m not going to be stuck here for the next four days 24/7.”

Marie sighed. She’d known Kitty would be a handful, but this was ridiculous.

Oh, she’d been fine at first -- the painkillers had kept her nice and woozy, and even when she started to come out of it, she’d been content to trade vocabulary with Lia and Irena. (Amal had been too shy to remain for long, evidently unable to deal with being surrounded by girls.) For all her snark, Kitty could be extremely patient when she really wanted to, but eventually, sure as shitting, restlessness kicked in.

Marie really couldn’t blame her, either. She wouldn’t have wanted to be stuck in bed all day (well, maybe with Logan, but that was another story entirely. Didn’t matter that they couldn’t actually do, well, the sort of thing she’d _like_ to do, as long as they were both there.) So long as she stayed in the wheelchair, going down to dinner couldn’t hurt -- after all, she’d be sitting up to eat no matter where she was.

“Fine. But if Hank gets pissy, I’m throwin’ him at you.”

“I can deal with that. There are a few things I just have to find out in person.” Her smile was just a little evil.

 _Meaning she wants to know if whatever she did to Clarice and Ororo worked._ Though Marie would never admit it, she was pretty curious herself.

She and Anathea helped Kitty into the chair, both refusing her request to go for a run so she could zoom. Marie suspected she only asked because she knew they’d say no.

When they reached the kitchen, they found it extremely crowded. It looked like everyone in the house was there, even _Alfred_ (thanks to Logan, she was never, ever going to be able to think that name without his ridiculous emphasis). They’d had to extend the dining table, and even then, people were going to be jostling elbows something fierce. She’d pick an end seat, so at least she’d only have to worry about accidentally bumping into one person.

It smelled downright delicious, too. Logan had grabbed two pot roasts at the store, and somebody -- probably Clarice -- had produced seasoned mashed potatoes and stewed corn. There was even a giant bowl of some kind of fruit punch. Marie eyed it all with undisguised greed. She still wasn’t used to the sight of actual food.

It seemed like Anathea’s group wasn’t, either, though their expressions were rather more like awe. At least Marie had been used to this sort of thing, at one point in her life -- they, it seemed, had never been.

Clarice whirled around when they came in, brandishing a wooden spoon at Kitty. “ _You_ ,” she hissed. “As soon as you’re off medical leave, you are a dead woman.”

Marie looked at Kitty, who was trying so very, very hard to keep a straight face. It was a losing battle -- she burst out laughing, and immediately winced. “Found your presents, huh?”

“Yes,” Clarice said flatly, “I did. All I can say is just. You. Wait.”

“Bring it,” Kitty said, still giggling. “This is a war you know you can’t win.”

“Why are you on medical leave?” Magneto asked. He was, of course, lurking in the corner, surveying the entire scene with vague mistrust.

Kitty pointed at Hank, who’d already sat down. “Blame him. He made me go the ER, and then he gave me babysitters.” She jerked her thumbs at Marie and Anathea behind her. 

“A normal person would thank me,” Hank muttered.

“If you were looking for normal, you chose...poorly,” Magneto intoned.

“I’d be offended, but you’re not far off,” Kitty said. “Is anybody else totally starving?”

Marie certainly was; the scent of all that food set her stomach rumbling like an avalanche. She wheeled Kitty forward, pulling a kitchen chair out of the way. Whoever had set the table had actually brought in wildflowers from the garden -- a sweet touch she knew damn well nobody in her group would have thought of.

When she sat, Logan immediately took the seat beside her, which was a relief. She wasn’t afraid of accidentally whacking him with her elbow. Kitty, who she’d placed across from them, raised her eyebrows.

“Logan, did you get domesticated when I wasn’t looking?”

“I’m choosin’ to blame that on the painkillers,” he grunted, glowering at her. “Otherwise I’d have to make you pay for that.”

“No stealing my job,” Clarice said. She left the oven bearing one of the roasts on a platter, holding it like some kind of sacrifice to the gods. “Sit, everybody.”

“You’re the one who’s supposed to be paying,” Kitty pointed out. “Anything you do is defense.”

Anathea’s group approached the table almost timidly, looking at the food like they expected it to disappear if they blinked. Amal, who was obviously bracing himself while looking slightly terrified, sat beside Logan -- stiffly, like he was anticipating being hit. Just what in the shit had these poor people actually gone through?

“Not gonna eat you, kid,” Logan said, even though there was little chance the boy would understand him. His tone must have been enough, because Amal relaxed a little, turning his attention back to the roasts.

Janek, looking both shy and somewhat creepily keen, started toward Kitty, but froze halfway, paling. What in the --? Oh. Magneto looked ready to rip the kid’s liver out and force-feed it to him.

Um.

What.

Marie elbowed Logan, who looked from one to the other and shrugged. He shook his head, which she interpreted to mean that nothing had actually changed on _that_ front. 

“If you say so,” she muttered, as Janek made a beeline for the far end of the table. Magneto looked so insufferably smug that Marie wanted to throw something at him. That was not the way to build any kind of trust with these people.

“Dish up,” Ororo said. Anathea’s blank look made her try again. “It means put food on your plate. Take as much as you want.”

The girl relayed this to the others, and all of them but _Alfred_ looked like it was Christmas morning. He, of course, glowered, but by now Marie didn’t expect any different from him, and she doubted the others did, either.

“Good food, good meat, good God, let’s eat,” she said, mostly to herself. Logan snorted, and Kitty almost choked on a sip of punch.

“Is that a common American blessing?” Magneto asked.

“It was in my house,” she retorted, stabbing the end of one roast before anyone could beat her to it.

Logan smirked. She’d been pondering all day what to do if he had another nightmare tonight, and she had a few ideas. Only time would tell if they’d actually work, though.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What’s this? Dark Xavier family secrets? Dun dun dunnnn. Don’t worry, Kitty is not going to let a silly thing like immobility stop her revenge on Clarice and Ororo. And Marie has some...interesting...ideas for how to get Logan a good night’s sleep. (Not like that. At least, not yet. Give them time.)


	17. Things That go Bump in the Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Rogue attempts to drug the nightmares out of Logan and Hank, Kitty gets creative with sponges and hot glue guns, we find out more about Sentinel War Two, and the Professor does a little digging in Logan’s head.

Marie volunteered to help Hank and Ororo clean up the kitchen, leaving Anathea to take Kitty back to her room

“You go on up too, sugar,” she said to Logan. “I know you might have more nightmares, but I want to see if I can’t make you get some decent sleep before then. So I’m makin’ you a thing.”

“A thing?” he asked, arching an eyebrow.

“A thing. My granny’s recipe. Always helped me sleep, when I was a kid.”

“Marie, you are not seriously gonna feed me warm milk and tuck me in, are you?”

Ororo coughed back a strangled laugh, and he glared at the back of her head.

“No.” Well, there was a little milk involved, but that was just one ingredient. It was the spiced rum and vanilla that really did the trick. “Go on.” She made a shooing motion with her hands, and he rolled his eyes before he left.

“...You’re going to feed him warm milk, aren’t you,” Ororo said.

Marie laughed. “Well, sorta. Dunno how Granny ever got away with givin’ it to me -- it’s mostly spiced rum and vanilla mixed with milk, with a little cinnamon. Professor already had the rum, and I got the rest at the store.”

“Your _grandmother_ gave you that?” Hank asked.

She shrugged. “I grew up in the South,” she said. “Granny’s generation did things a little...different.”

“Apparently.”

“Hey, you can’t argue with the results.” She dug a saucepan out of the cupboard, filling the bottom with water from the tap before putting it on the burner. It would have to heat for a while, before she added anything else. “Hank, did you have nightmares last night?”

He shifted from foot to foot and looked away. “I did. Bad. From what the other three said, we all had pretty much the same one.”

“Thought so. You want I should make enough of this for two?”

He looked torn, and she thought she could guess why. There was hardly anything actually medicinal about this concoction she was brewing. It was pure backwoods. “If you wouldn’t mind,” he said, sounding a little defeated. “I’m not usually much of a drinker, but if it actually works, I’ll take it.”

“Never failed me,” Marie assured him. “I oughtta make it for all of you. Might do it tomorrow.”

“Rogue, did Logan hurt you at all, when he had his nightmare?” Ororo asked, and Marie knew she was thinking of their first night in the mansion all those years ago, when she’d gone to wake him up and gotten skewered for her trouble.

“No,” she said. “No, he actually threw himself outta bed. I’m not worried.”

Ororo looked like _she_ was, but she said nothing. Marie and Logan were both adults, after all; their business was their business. Marie trusted him.

She tested the temperature of the water with her pinky finger, and went to grab the milk. Bizarrely, although she hadn’t made this since she’d helped her granny brew it as a child, preparing it made her feel at home. She’d swear she could smell Granny’s wood-stove. 

It was weird to think, but her granny was alive now, down in Mississippi, and not much older than Marie herself. Hell, her parents were kids. Part of her wanted to find them -- just to see them, not meet or talk to. For her, it had been half a lifetime since she’d seen mother or father, and her granny had died when she was twelve.

But what was the point, really? She had her family here -- not just Logan, but Ororo, Kitty, and Clarice. Hank and Raven were on their way, the Professor would probably get there, too. Did she really want to see the kids who would someday be the parents who disowned her? Not hardly.

She added a dollop of rum -- that was her granny’s word. Granny never used measuring cups for anything, and she never needed to; somehow, everything she made always came out perfect. Marie hadn’t inherited her talent for cooking, but at least she could do this.

The rich scent of vanilla and cinnamon crept through the air, mingled with a healthy aroma of alcohol. She took the pan off the burner just before it started to boil, and carefully poured its contents into two mugs. “Careful,” she said, handing one to Hank, “it’s pretty hot. Might wanna let it cool a bit, or you’ll blister your tongue.”

“Thanks,” he said, sniffing it. “This really works?” he asked, his voice wavering slightly.

“Like I said, it always has for me. Granny wasn’t a doctor, but she knew her shit.”

With that semi-profane encouragement, she took the other mug and carefully carried it up the stairs. She didn’t doubt Logan would smell it long before she got there.

When she opened the door, she found him watching with raised eyebrows. “It’s warm milk, isn’t it,” he said flatly, but there was amusement as well as exasperation in his eyes.

“And a lotta booze,” Marie retorted. “Try it. I promise you’ll like it.”

When she gave him the mug, he took a deep, suspicious sniff. Apparently, the fact that it had milk in it at all meant he didn’t trust it, but when she crossed her arms, he took a sip. His surprised expression made her laugh.

“Told you,” she said. “I’m gonna go take a shower. You’d better finish that before I get back.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

\--

Erik stayed awake far longer than he ought to have, searching the library for anything in German. He didn’t want to admit it, even to himself, but he was afraid to sleep.

Nightmares were not new to him. They’d grown much rarer over the years, but occasionally his dreams were still haunted by the camps, by Shaw. None of those were even close to what he’d endured last night.

Finally, at about one o’clock, he decided it was time to man up and get it over with. If his nightmares returned, so be it -- he needed sleep. He’d actually managed to quiet his mind, more or less, when he reached his room, finding, at least temporarily, something approaching serenity.

Unfortunately, as soon as he laid down, he discovered that someone -- most likely Clarice -- had left him presents.

God _dammit_.

\--

Kitty stayed in her room like a good little girl until about eleven-thirty. Hank had fed her some painkillers before she went back to bed, and left a couple more, along with a piece of bread, in case she woke up sore in the night.

The problem, which he should have already realized after the debacle in France, was that opiates made her jittery. She’d eaten the second round at ten-thirty, giving up all hope of sleep, and waited until she was sure everyone else would have conked out for the night to sneak her way down to the kitchen again. She had plans for Clarice, and God knew she wouldn’t get the chance to put them together during the day, with everybody breathing down her neck.

The mansion was eerie, but not in the way the one in France had been. While she took a flashlight, she rarely turned it on -- she knew the layout of the downstairs very well, having snuck to the kitchens in the middle of the night dozens of times when she was a student. There was no sign of anyone. Perfect.

By the light of the bulb over the oven, she dug through the kitchen cupboards. A few minutes later, the table was piled with a weird assortment of shit: Saran Wrap, a jar of mayonnaise, a pot of honey, a saucer full of grated cheese, a bottle of ammonia, and some weird red powder in an unlabeled Mason jar. 

When she was finally discovered, she was busily slicing thin strips off a sponge with a cleaver almost as long as her forearm. She cringed, expecting another lecture, but it was only Magneto -- who looked _incredibly_ pissed-off, until he took in her workstation and did a slight double-take.

“Clarice?” she asked, sawing away at the sponge.

“I’m assuming. She put plastic bags of water under my sheet, and they burst when I laid down.”

She tried not to laugh. Really, she did. Unfortunately, what with the painkillers, her already tenuous brain-to-mouth barrier had totally dissolved, and she cackled -- quietly, but she cackled. “Sorry,” she said, hiccuping. “Really, I mean it, but you have to admit, that’s a little brilliant. If it makes you feel any better, my garlic-bombs worked.”

“I know,” he said dryly. “I could smell it halfway down the wing. What on Earth are you doing now?”

“I was hoping you’d ask,” she said, with a little too much glee. “We need to figure out what rooms they’re in now -- I can give that a shot, while they’re asleep and there’s nobody to bitch at me for walking around -- and then we’re somehow going to have to back in during the day, which, yeah, is going to be a lot harder, since you can’t walk through walls. I take the sponges, get them a little damp, then soak them in the honey. They’ll stick to the underside of whatever -- dresser drawers, end-tables, that kind of thing. Coat them in mayonnaise and they’ll start to reek like anything in a few hours, if the day’s hot enough.”

His eyebrows rose. “All right, I’m intrigued,” he said, taking the sat across from her. “And the cheese?”

Kitty grinned. “The cheese. So, the showerheads in the bathrooms are all the sunflower kind, right? Well, they unscrew pretty easily. I melt the cheese, let it harden, then stick it to the back of the showerhead. The hot water will melt it again, so it’ll spew out stringy cheese rather than water. That’s going to have to wait until they’ve switched rooms around, though. I actually don’t know what I’m going to do with the ammonia or that red stuff, though.”

She paused for breath long enough to realize that, while he might be intrigued, he also looked half-dead. “Dude, you are seriously tired,” she said. “There’s plenty of other rooms you could steal.”

He said nothing, and a flash of insight worked its way through the Vicoden high. “You don’t want to sleep, do you? Because of the nightmares?”

He glared at her. “So?”

Kitty shrugged. “Hey, I get it. Everybody’s got nightmares, in our future. Go crash on the couch,” she said, pointing with the cleaver. The corner held a rather battered old sofa, though the Professor would probably call it ‘antique’. There had been a couch there in her time, too, though a lot newer, facing a plasma TV. “I’ll wake you up if you start flailing.”

“Would you, actually?” Magneto asked, suspicion dripping from the words.

She rolled her eyes. “I said I would, didn’t I? Go sleep, you’ll be useless tomorrow if you’re too tired to function. You’d better not snore.”

He actually smiled, though it was more weary than anything else. “I don’t, to my knowledge. Don’t get caught with all these things, or someone will take them away.”

“I know,” she grumbled. “Spoilsports. Seriously. Go. Now.”

He didn’t actually roll his eyes, but she got the distinct impression he wanted to. Go he did -- and he must have been as exhausted as he looked, because he was asleep within minutes.

“Poor fucker,” Kitty muttered, and she actually meant it.

\--

Logan had Marie to look after him when he had nightmares, but Clarice had no one, so Ororo decided to sit up in her room, just in case. She herself wasn’t remotely tired, even after that big meal; she’d always been more of a night-owl than a morning person.

They’d had to move rooms, of course, thanks to Kitty (and it had to have been Kitty. Magneto wouldn’t think of something that comparatively harmless yet totally obnoxious.) The garlic stink had traveled, so they’d had to go quite a ways closer to the main house, but it was better than living with the stench. Thank God Kitty was laid up for now.

While Clarice slept, Ororo took the scarf off her head, and scowled at the fork still twined in her hair. She was not going to cut it out, dammit. With a sigh, she perched herself on the bathroom counter and began patiently prying, plotting murder with each hair she accidentally yanked out.

The moon rose while she worked, washing the lawn outside a pale silver. Since the night was so hot, they’d left all the windows open -- apparently the school didn’t get air conditioning put in until sometime after 1973, unfortunately -- and the scent of sun-parched grass drifted in. It soothed her temper a little, though not by much.

A scream tore her out of her somewhat cranky reverie. It wasn’t a loud, piercing thing -- it was low and strangled, trailing off into a terrified whimper.

Storm scrambled off the counter, totally lacking her normal grace, and ran into the bedroom. Clarice was thrashing, clawing at her throat as though something was choking her. When Storm touched her arm, she flinched, and tried to scream again.

“Clarice -- _Clarice_ , wake up. It’s just a nightmare.” She had to shake the poor girl several times before her eyes opened, and she drew a deep, shuddering breath. “It’s just a nightmare.”

Clarice shuddered again. “It’s not,” she whispered. “It can’t be. It’s too -- it’s not a nightmare, it’s _not_.” She sounded almost childlike in her terror. Errant strands of hair were stuck to her sweat-sheened forehead, her electric-green eyes wide and horrified. “There was something down there with us, Ororo. Something real, and it’s...it’s like it came here with us, the four of us.”

She was only half-rational, but Ororo wasn’t going to discount what she was saying. “You need to talk to the Professor,” she said, squeezing Clarice’s hand. “If you’re right...he needs to know what’s going on. This is the second night of this, isn’t it.”

Clarice gulped nodded. She crawled out of bed and made her unsteady way to the bathroom, filling the glass on the counter with water and drinking it down in three long, noisy swallows.

“Do you want me to get you anything?” Ororo asked, more than a little concerned. 

She shook her head. “No. Just...God, please don’t leave me alone in here.”

“I won’t,” Ororo promised. “I’ll stay until dawn, but then I’m going to go find the Professor, okay? You need to be able to sleep.”

“I know,” Clarice said miserably, sitting on the floor and hugging her knees. “I just...I can’t do that again, Ororo. I can’t.”

Ororo went and sat beside her. “The Professor can fix it,” she said, and hoped she was right. The older Charles, the one she’d known for so many years -- _he_ could almost certainly do it, but this Charles, for all his compassion, was still so very young. She didn’t yet know if he had a breaking point. “Would going for a walk help?”

Clarice sniffled. “Yeah, maybe,” she said. “If this is anything like last night, I probably won’t be alone for long.”

Figuring that darkness was the main enemy at this point, Ororo turned on the main switches in the hallway, filling it with warm light. There was still a faint odor of garlic, which actually made Clarice smile a little -- and made Ororo wonder if this prank war might not be as much a blessing as it was a curse. Yes, it was annoying as hell, but you couldn’t say it wasn’t distracting.

“We’ll get her back for that,” Clarice said, a little shakily. “Sometime.”

“Once she’s on her feet again,” Ororo agreed. “I’m not good at this, though. You’re in charge of the creative side.” She wasn’t just throwing Clarice a sop, either; she really _wasn’t_ good at this kind of juvenile activity. Her brain did not run along those lines.

“I’ll do my best,” Clarice muttered, and while there wasn’t exactly a lightness to her tone, at least it was less bleak.

When they reached the main staircase, Ororo wasn’t at all surprised to see Hank and Raven up as well. She was somewhat startled to see Anathea with them, though: did that girl ever sleep?

“You too, huh?” he asked. His complexion was downright grey, the pockets under his eyes bruise-dark. He was swaying a little on his feet, obviously beyond exhausted, but he had to be as afraid to sleep as Clarice was.

“Yeah. Probably Logan and Magneto, also, but like we’ll ever hear it from _them._ They’ll just be super cranky tomorrow. Today, I guess.” She paused. “Does anyone else want ice cream?”

“What is ice cream?” Anathea asked.

Clarice blinked at her. “You don’t -- okay, that’s it. Come on. You’re about to learn about the wonders of frozen dairy products. Hank, move it. I need your science brain.”

Ororo looked at Raven, who shrugged, but smiled a little. Whatever worked. 

The kitchen light, they found, was already on, and Kitty was sitting at the table, wielding a hot-glue gun with a little too much intensity. She appeared to be gluing dried macaroni to a platform shoe, so intently that she did not, at first, notice them.

“You’re not in the basement,” she said, sounding a little annoyed. “You’re in the New York house. There’s nothing in here with you but me, so go the fuck to sleep. Real sleep.”

Given that Logan would definitely be with Rogue right now, that left only Magneto -- who was, Ororo saw, attempting to sleep on the couch in the corner. He too was obviously in the throes of a nightmare, but his ‘watcher’, as Ororo supposed she and Raven were, was markedly less sympathetic.

He didn’t sleep -- not peacefully, at least, but he didn’t wake, either. With a sigh, Kitty carefully set down her glue gun, and limped her way to the couch. Hank opened his mouth to say something, but Clarice whacked him in the chest, silencing him. 

“Look,” Kitty said, much more patiently, with something akin to actual sympathy in her expression, “I realize we’ve got a truce right now, but if you don’t either wake up or stop dreaming, I’m sticking a macaroni noodle in your ear. You’ve got five seconds. Five. Four. Three.”

“I hate you,” he grumbled, opening his eyes and glaring at her.

“It’s mutual. Turn over and you’ll change dreams.”

“That’s an old wive’s tale.”

“Then get up and help me glue. I’ll even be nice and make you coffee.”

“You mean you’ll make _you_ coffee, and let me have some.”

Kitty snorted. “You said it, not me.” Only now did she look up, and realize she had a semi-baffled audience. A momentary flash of panic flitted across her face, as she glanced at the table full of...things.

“That isn’t what it looks like,” she said hurriedly.

Ororo took it in. It wasn’t just macaroni. There was a tin of marbles, six mismatched shoelaces carefully stretched out and lined up, a wooden lawn stake, and a very small garden-gnome. “Kitty, I’m honestly not sure _what_ it looks like,” she said, a little helplessly. “Coffee might be a good idea, though. There’s two more nightmare cases here.”

“Coffee?” Anathea asked, confused.

Clarice managed a little smile. “I am going to have so much fun with you.”

\--

Ten minutes later, the table had been cleared of Kitty’s assorted...instruments, replaced by mugs of coffee and several large bowls of ice cream. Magneto, predictably, had passed, but at least he kept his thoughts to himself as he drank his coffee.

Hank had tried to lecture Kitty, but Clarice kicked him in the leg. Now was really not the time. There was enough negativity going on as it was.

Even after ice cream and coffee, her hands were still unsteady, and small shudders wracked her at random intervals. She couldn’t shake the feeling of being surrounded and squeezed, like she was being smothered and crushed in the vastness of space.

Anathea, who knew nothing of the basement, was looking at her with grave concern. Ice cream had been the cause of much wonder for her, though coffee proved less impressive, until they’d added quite a lot of sugar and milk. She must not be used to caffeine, because she twitched occasionally.

“So how come you can understand us, and the rest of your people can’t?” Clarice asked -- half for something to say, and half because she was genuinely curious.

“I read,” Anathea said. “Old books. Not many, but I read them all. Old English, but also French, because Trask is in France. The others know some, but not much.”

And yet they could all read. That suggested to Clarice that their language had simply evolved into something almost unrecognizable to anyone from this time period. Kind of like modern English and Middle English. “What year did you come from?”

Anathea shook her head, a wry smile twisting her lips. “No one know that,” she said. “Not anymore. There was a time between wars, but we do not know how long. Second War start -- started? -- long time before I was born.”

No wonder every little thing seemed so fascinating to her. She really had never known anything but a world gone to shit.

“Are there any mutants, in your time?” Hank asked.

She shook her head. “Not for a long time. Sentinels kill them all, and then hunt us. They were never built to stop.”

“Who built them?” Magneto asked, to Clarice’s surprise. Oh, she wasn’t surprised he was _listening_ , but she wouldn’t have expected him to actually contribute to the conversation. “Again. And why, after the hell they created the first time?”

Anathea frowned. “Mutants,” she said. “There was a group, they want to build more Sentinels to kill the humans. All they did was make them kill _everyone_.”

Clarice was not the only one who looked at him. While he might not have created it yet, his Brotherhood of Mutants had pretty much the same idea in mind. She had to forcibly remind herself that in this new timeline, he wouldn’t necessarily go down that path.

He scowled blackly at all of them, but subsided a little when Kitty turned and kicked his foot, much as Clarice had done to Hank. Again there was a tiny, almost grudging pinprick of sympathy in her expression. She didn’t actually say anything, but apparently she didn’t need to. He got some kind of message.

“Don’t blame me for the sins of my older self,” he said, rather harshly. “He didn’t see the things I have.” 

“What he’s trying to say,” Kitty said, pouring herself more coffee, “is that, since his future self failed so badly in our timeline, he knows he has to do something different this time.”

Magneto choked on his coffee, which made Clarice think Kitty must actually be right. “You were drunk and high as the stars when we had that conversation,” he said, coughing a little. “How could you possibly remember it?”

Kitty grinned into her mug. There was a trace of almost vicious satisfaction in it. “You know how you asked how I survived so long in a dystopian future? They who forget important things have their faces burned off.”

Clarice shuddered. Kitty wasn’t just picking that description at random -- they’d both seen it happen. “She’s right, you know. It...smells.” It had been a good two years before either had been able to stomach the thought of eating meat. Not that that had been much of a problem, considering how much of a rarity meat was.

Anathea gave her a sympathetic look, but said nothing. Having come from a similarly horrible future, she didn’t need to -- she understood firsthand.

“...Oh.” There was an inflection, even in that one syllable, that Clarice had never heard from him before, and it took her sleep-deprived brain a moment to translate it. She kept forgetting that he’d been in a concentration camp as a child. Yeah, he’d understand, too.

“I could tell you what makes that smell,” Hank said, “but I think instead I’ll talk about...kittens. We should get some kittens. They’re cute and fuzzy and impossible to be afraid of.”

“What is kittens?” Anathea asked. Clarice could already tell that educating the girl about all the good things in the world would be the best therapy for her own nightmares. 

“They have to be seen to be believed,” she said, since she was quite sure Anathea would have no idea what the word ‘cute’ even meant. “And held. Hank, can we go after breakfast?”

“Only if you cover your hair and put some makeup on,” Ororo said firmly, before he could. “And either Raven or I need to drive.” No doubt she didn’t trust any of them not to fall asleep at the wheel.”

“Fine. But you’re staying home,” he said, pointing his spoon at Kitty. “You’re not off the hook for sitting up all night, doing...whatever it was you were doing.”

“Okay,” she said, and yawned.

Her ready agreement made Clarice intensely suspicious. Still, that suspicion was better than the lingering dread of her nightmares, so she’d let it go. For now.

\--

Marie’s alcoholic milk did work, at least up to a point. Logan still woke in the grip -- almost literally -- of a suffocating nightmare, but at least he got a few hours of sleep before then.

When he woke, he didn’t fling himself away, this time, nor did his claws extend. He was surrounded by warmth and the scent of Marie, which his instincts must have latched onto even before actual consciousness stirred.

The sleeve of his shirt was too long for her arms, and she’d pressed the hem of one against his face, using it as a barrier so she could rest her fingers on his cheek. “It’s all right, sugar,” she said, her voice slightly hoarse from sleep. “You’re not there -- you’re here. _I’m_ here. Only thing worth bein’ scared of in the school is Hank’s singin’.”

In spite of his horror, of his jackhammering heart, he laughed. It was less what she said than the way she said it -- her accent, so thick even after all these years, was weirdly musical to him, and soothing in a way nothing else could have been.

He tried to speak, but all that came out was a croak. Clearing his throat, he managed, “The Professor told me to come see him, when I had another nightmare. He wants to poke around in my head, and see if he can’t find the source.”

“He’ll be awake?” Marie asked.

“He said he would. You go on back to sleep. I’ll see what he’s got to say.”

“Screw that,” she said, sitting up. “You stayed with me when he had to dig through my mind. I’m not gonna leave you alone to go through the same thing.”

Logan wanted to argue, but there was that tone again, the one that suggested that, while he _could_ argue with her, it would only be an exercise in futility. Whatever had happened in the camps hadn’t broken her inner steel, that was for damn sure. “All right,” he said. “But I’m makin’ you breakfast later, and don’t you argue about it.” He knew it would take a while for her to put on enough weight to even be considered just skinny, but that wasn’t going to stop him trying to get her to eat enough for two people. 

“Not gonna. You cook bacon even better than my mama ever did.” She gave him a grin, hauling herself out of the bed. “Now c’mon, we’d better do this before the rest of Nightmare Brigade wakes up. I gave Hank some of what I gave you, and I hope it worked a little.”

“Did for me,” Logan grunted, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. He wondered if it would be different later, if he’d be able to take a nap without that _thing_ trying to crawl into his body and squeeze him to death. It was worth a shot, anyway.

He hadn’t checked the clock, but it was so early that dawn had barely stirred itself. The sky was still dark, but there was a very faint glow on the eastern horizon. The air had finally cooled down, and there was a light breeze wafting in through the open windows.

The Professor, sure enough, was in his study, reading what Logan suspected was another journal. He looked up when they entered, not at all surprised. “A little earlier than you predicted,” he said, shutting the book. “Come over here,” he added, wheeling himself toward what had yesterday been an empty corner. Hank must have dragged a couple armchairs up here, setting them up beneath one large window. Of course the Professor would have had him bring two -- he would have known Marie would come along for the ride.

“Just stay quiet and still, both of you,” he said, when they’d taken their seats. “This will be much like I did with you, Marie. Logan, did I ever read your mind, in the future?”

Logan actually smiled, though it was lopsided and tired. “Yeah,” he said. “Many times. I know what it feels like.”

“Then I’m sorry,” the Professor said, seriously. “I can’t help but make you re-live it. This won’t be quite like what you and I did, Marie. You showed me only what you wanted me to see, but Logan, I’m going to have to dig deeper. There are likely things in your memory of the basement that you are not consciously aware of.”

“Figured as much. I know this won’t be any fun, but this isn’t my first rodeo, Professor. Might be worse for you than it is for me.” That was a genuine worry, too. There were things in his head he wouldn’t want to inflict on the older Professor, let alone this young Charles who lacked the sheer life experience of his older self.

“I know,” he said, a little grimly, “but it has to be done. Just try to relax, as much as you can.”

Yeah, that wasn’t going to happen, but he could give it a shot. Marie laid a hand on his arm, her fingers warm through his sleeve. She didn’t say anything, but she didn’t need to. She was Marie.

 _He’d always suspected that the only reason anyone could ever feel the Professor in their heads was because he_ wanted _them to. There was a conscientious trail weaving through his thoughts, letting Logan know exactly where he was, and what he was doing. It was a rather soothing thing -- at first, anyway. Soon he could feel the Professor’s thoughts tugging at the ragged edges of the lingering nightmare, and he tensed before he could help himself._

_The warmth of Marie’s hand steadied him a little, her small fingers giving his arm a light squeeze. It eased his pulse back down to something closer to normal, and the feel of it steadied him as he plunged into the darkness again._

_It should have been easier this time, since he had company, but it wasn’t. The blackness crushed him again, its malevolent presence creeping into his senses, taking them over and shutting them off one by one. The thing in the dark hunted him, turning him from predator to prey as slow but insidious paralysis gripped him._

_It broke abruptly, just before he was certain it would suffocate him. Light stabbed into his eyes, temporarily blinding him. When his vision cleared, he found that he was not nearly so alone as he’d thought. A group of people surrounded him, made visible only by the light of a single bare, dim bulb above his head._

_At first glance, they were...ordinary. Men and women, mostly young, dressed in clothing typical of the twenties. There were no visible injuries on any of them, no sign of trauma, and though they were all extremely pale, they looked alive._

_They had no smell, though, of life or death -- though he saw them, according to his nose, they didn’t exist. Still and silent, they made no move to touch him, yet somehow, through some terrible miracle, their presence was far worse than the darkness._

_It was their eyes. Though they were flat and lifeless as a glass doll’s eye, they were_ alive, _glittering with malice, and so very, very_ hungry _._

_The woman in front of him -- young, blonde, wearing a nurse’s uniform -- reached out, icy fingers caressing his face for a moment before they raked down his cheek, tearing at his skin as though it were tissue paper --_

He blinked, his consciousness quite abruptly slammed right back into waking reality. Frigid sweat had broken out on the back of his neck and his temples, clinging like the darkness, and he shuddered. “What,” he asked, his voice unwilling to raise louder than a whisper, “the _hell_ was that?”

When he looked a the Professor, he found his face had gone sheet-pale, his eyes wide and distant. “I...I don’t know,” he said hoarsely. “Nothing I’ve ever, ever felt before. It’s -- it’s an alien presence, not part of _your_ mind at all. I don’t know what to do,” he said, completely helpless.

Marie squeezed Logan’s arm again. “Would it help,” she said, “if he had company? Not in the dream -- if it’s not part of his mind, I don’t see how anyone else could connect while he was havin’ it -- but just...while he’s asleep?”

It took Logan a moment to realize what she meant. “No,” he said. “Marie, I’m not lettin’ you anywhere _near_ that.”

She gave him the look he both loved and hated -- the one that told him he’d shift the world with a crowbar before he’d make her budge. “Sugar, you gotta remember, I’ve got a lot of practice, shuttin’ alien things away in my own mind. I might be able to teach you.”

The Professor visibly shook himself. “Marie, what do you mean?”

“My mutation,” she said. “I don’t just suck up a person’s life force and power -- I get a piece of their thoughts, too. You -- future you -- taught me how to...cage that, all the others in my head, so they couldn’t drive me crazy. Been doin’ it half my life.”

He looked from her to Logan, who scowled. “We can test it,” he said, ignoring the scowl. “Logan, the nightmare itself -- the force that created it -- has latched onto you. It shouldn’t transfer to Marie, but she _should_ be able to wake you from it. You sense one another’s distress so sharply already -- a weak link would only heighten that. As it is, you’re so close that I wouldn’t have to do much to link you.”

“Don’t argue with me, sugar,” she said. “I’m not leavin’ you to deal with that on your own. You wouldn’t, either, if things were reversed.”

God dammit, she had a point. No, he wouldn’t hesitate a second if he was in her position, and he couldn’t deny her the chance to help him -- not unless he wanted to open a whole other can of worms. He was a stubborn bastard, but when Marie really dug her heels in, she could out-stubborn the entire damn world.

“Okay,” he said, “though I know I’m gonna regret this.”

The Professor gave him the faintest ghost of a smile. “I don’t think you will,” he said. “Out of the four of you who were in that basement, I think you’re the only one I can help, at least like this. Logan, I need you to send Clarice to me. There might be little I can do for her, but I have to try.”

Logan sighed. “You’re you,” he said. “I know you do. If she won’t come on her own, I’ll grab her and drag her by her feet if I have to. Marie, are you sure you’re ready for this?”

“If I wasn’t, d’ you really think I’d have suggested it?”

He gave her a Look with a capital L. “Considerin’ it’s you, yeah, I think you would anyway.”

She gave him a glare, though there wasn’t any real heat in it. “Hush, you. I _am_ ready, so let’s do this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who would have thought nightmares and ice cream were good for interpersonal bonding? How Rogue will handle Logan’s remains to be seen, but she might be setting a precedent.
> 
> The thing with the sponges and honey is something my uncle apparently did to one of his teachers in high school.


	18. Battle at the Center of the Mind (And Kittens)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which there are kittens, squeeing, a grudgingly kind Kitty, and the darkness in Logan’s head discovers just why fucking with Rogue is a bad, bad, _bad idea._

Kitty had absolutely no intention of toddling off to bed when the herd left in search of kittens. Exhausted though she was, this was probably the only opportunity she’d have to get this done.

She’d planned on dragooning Magneto to help her, but he’d actually managed to fall asleep again, and even she wasn’t evil enough to wake him up. God knew he hadn’t got much rest last night, and she wasn’t willing to deal with his sleep-deprived crankiness. At least, that’s what she told herself. The thought of actually feeling genuine pity for the bastard was a distinctly uncomfortable one, so she ignored it.

Her assorted goodies went into a plastic laundry hamper, which, thanks to her ribs and leg, she couldn’t actually carry. In the end the she tied the shoelaces into one long string, tied the string around the basket-handle, and dragged it after her. Damn Logan for taking away her skateboard. This was going to take so much longer than it should. It was a long way to garlic-wing, and she had to get this done before everyone came back (though if they actually brought kittens, she’d forgive them almost anything).

Sure enough, it took her fifteen minutes to even get there, and another twenty to hunt through the rooms. Neither Ororo nor Clarice would have been willing to stand the garlic, so they would have chosen spaces much closer to the house.

Clarice, thanks to her nightmares, was once again temporarily off-limits. It was still open season on Ororo, though, which was what made Kitty’s next discovery so aggravating: apparently, Ororo had stayed with Clarice last night. She was probably the one who’d woken the poor woman from her nightmare.

Well. Goddammit. Kitty hadn’t made all this crap just so it could go to waste. She paused, leaning against the wall to take the weight off her leg, and considered.

Planting it in their room would be a violation of the unwritten rules of this engagement. Setting it up in the rooms next _door_ , however -- it might be rules lawyering, but whatever. The vents were almost all interconnected, so if she stuck her mayonnaise sponges over the vent the next room over, the smell would still carry -- just much less pungent. It was better than nothing. Fortunately, all the grates were on the baseboard, so she wouldn’t actually have to scale any furniture. The sponges stuck with a satisfying _splat_ , and she grinned before digging out the jar of window-cleaner. She didn’t know just what the hell they put in it in the 70’s, but it was much stinkier than it had ever been when she was a kid.

By the time she was done, her limbs were heavy with exhaustion, and she was more than happy to stow the basket and stagger her way back to her own room. When the others returned, they’d find her napping like a good little Kitty, none the wiser to her...activities...until it was too late. She only hoped she was awake to see the results.

When she reached her room, she crawled up into bed and curled up with all her blankets, very much like an actual cat. She was out almost as soon as she’d shut her eyes.

\--

After their somewhat exhausting meeting with the Professor, Logan and Marie stayed shut up in their room for several hours, dozing. Neither manage to actually sleep, despite the fact that both were extremely tired. Finally, he gave up.

“I said I was makin’ you breakfast, didn’t I?” he said, sitting up. “Kitchen’s probably deserted by now.”

Marie looked like she wanted to protest, but her stomach chose that moment to growl. She gave him a slightly sheepish smile. “I hope so. Don’t think I want to deal with the whole zoo right now.”

“Me neither. C’mon, darlin’.” He took her hand and pulled her after him. They snuck down the stairs like kids evading a teacher, Marie trying to stifle a laugh. 

The entryway, they found, was quite crowded -- practically everyone currently in the house was there, clustered around Hank, who was holding a basket of -- kittens? Really? Logan was blaming that on either Kitty or Clarice. The thought of having a mansion full of little furballs wasn’t one he was particularly fond of. Cats were messy; they shed all over and chewed on absolutely everything, and gacked up hairballs in the doorway at three in the morning, right where you’d step on it when you woke up. 

When he looked at Anathea and her friends, though, he thought he understood. They were fascinated by the little rodents, listening to the chorus of meowing and squeaking, though apparently not quite willing to touch them yet. It was so adorable it was a little sickening. He wanted to drag Marie onward, but she’d been drawn in, too, cooing over a fluffy ginger thing. The kittens -- there were _eight_ of the damn things -- looked like they’d all come from the same litter, because they were long-haired puffballs with eyes peeking out of the fuzz.

“Logan, we should give this one to Kitty,” she said, pointing at a white one that had alarmingly turquoise eyes. “Told her she just needed a white cat to pet.”

Clarice groaned. “God, don’t encourage her,” she said, sounding pained. She looked, however, far better than she should have, if she’d had the same nightmare last night, and so did Hank. Maybe, Logan thought grudgingly, bringing in all those furry little things was ultimately a good thing.

“Do any of them have names?” Marie asked.

“The shelter hadn’t gotten around to giving them any,” Hank said. “We can call them whatever we want.”

Marie squeed. She actually, straight-up, goddamn _squeed_. She was going to want that orange thing, Logan just knew it, and if he didn’t put up with it, she’d give him the sad eyes. The things he dealt with for that woman.

“If it sleeps on my pillow, I’m shavin’ it,” he warned, even as she cuddled the little creature in the crook of her arm. At least it was a living thing that she could actually touch, without worrying about killing it -- with all that fluff, it would be hard to even find the actual body. 

She gave him a grin, one of her big, sunny Marie-grins that were like nothing else on Earth. For that, he supposed he could tolerate one of those...things. “Oh, you’ll love him -- is it a him? -- _him_ in under two minutes. Bet you anythin’.” And with that, she shoved the fuzzball against his chest.

Logan looked down at it, and it looked up at him, blinking sleepily. It might be tiny, but it purred like a chainsaw, so loudly he could actually feel it resonating through his chest. All right, so maybe it was kind of...cute. But still.

“Hold him,” Marie encouraged, and there was that smile again. God dammit. It was enough to make him actually grab the kitten, holding it as gently as he was able -- just how breakable were these things? The creature squeaked, purred, and nuzzled against his palm.

“I guess it’s cute,” he said, a little grudgingly. “Just don’t let it crawl into the vents or anythin’.”

“You kiddin’? He’s not leavin’ my sight. We need to set up a room for them, Hank, with a litterbox and all that. They need a home base, before they start wanderin’ the house and gettin’ lost.”

“Stick them in Kitty’s room,” Clarice said. “If she’s surrounded by furry adorableness, maybe she’ll cut out the whole evil mastermind thing.”

Girl had a point. And if they all spent their first few days with that devious little lunatic, he wouldn’t have to deal with one trying to sleep on his face right away. “Good idea.”

“Can we come?” Anathea asked. She had a little black-and-white kitten snuggled under her chin.

“Doubt she’d mind. She’s probably bored out of her skull right now,” Marie said.

_Yeah_ , Logan thought, _if she’s actually stayed put like she’s supposed to_. He wasn’t holding his breath on _that_ one. “Go on, Marie,” he sighed. “I know you’d be happy puttin’ off breakfast for those things. I’ll dig through the fridge while you’re gettin’ covered in cat hair.”

And, yet again, that smile. Three times in under five minutes. “Thanks, sugar. I’ll be down in a bit.”

He shook his head, handing the kitten back to her and starting for the kitchen again. He swiped at the cat hair on his shirt, and sighed.

The kitchen wasn’t quite empty. A very groggy Magneto sat at the table, which was littered with empty bowls and coffee-cups, nursing a mug of what smelled like black tea. Logan debated telling him he looked like shit, but that would just be stating the very obvious.

“What’s all the shrieking about?” he asked, rubbing a hand over his face. “Did they actually bring home kittens?”

Logan snorted, opening the fridge and scanning its contents. They were going to have to go to the store again in a day or two, dammit. “Eight of ’em. Clarice thinks stashin’ ’em in Kitty’s room’ll keep her too busy to pull any more shit on her and Ororo. Whole goddamn household’s gonna go deliver that basket like it’s some sorta divine present.”

Magneto rubbed his temples, but paused. “Are they _all_ going?” he asked, a rather odd inflection in his voice.

“Everybody but the Professor and _Alfred_ ,” Logan said, completely unable to keep the derision out of his voice when he said the name. God knew what he’d do whenever he actually had to talk to the bastard again. Hopefully not knock all his teeth out.

“...Really.” The word was flat, and not remotely happy.

Realization dawned as Logan dug the carton of eggs out of the back of the fridge. “Okay, seriously,” he said, “I _know_ you ain’t interested, so what the hell is your problem with that Janek kid? He’s a little creepy, but he’s harmless. They all are.”

_Wow_ , did that earn him a glare. That was some Castle Bravo-level lethal shit. “I don’t trust him,” Magneto snapped. “The only one of that group I even halfway trust is Anathea. And no, I am not, as you say, _interested_ , but still.”

“Still what?” Logan asked, rinsing off a frying pan.

“Just... _still_. Shut up.” He set his mug down so forcefully that tea sloshed onto the table, stood, and shot Logan one more glare before he stalked out of the kitchen. For Janek’s sake, Logan hoped Magneto never caught him alone.

He shook his head, adding some butter to the pan.

Creepy, man. Fucking creepy. He should probably go with, just to make sure nobody got an accidental case of stabbed-in-the-face syndrome.

\--

Marie desperately needed some caffeine, but it could wait. There were eight fluffy little things that needed delivering.

It had been so long since she’d seen kittens -- so long since she’d seen animals of any kind. Growing up, her family had always had at least one cat, and in her opinion, the only thing in the world cuter than a kitten was a group of them.

Anathea wasn’t the only one of her group who didn’t seem to have any idea what a kitten was. They crowded around Hank, seriously hampering his ability to walk, jabbering questions at her: What did they eat? Where did they come from? Were they poisonous? It was all Marie could do not to laugh, though there was something deeply tragic about it, too. It said even more about the future they’d left behind them.

Behind him, Clarice was yawning hugely, half-leaning on Raven, who looked equally tired. Had Raven been up with Hank? Probably, unless Marie was completely blind. She hoped Clarice hadn’t been on her own -- if she and Ororo were still hiding from Kitty and Magneto, they’d probably stayed near one another, at least. While she’d probably never be able to talk Logan into taking a nap, hopefully the others would at least try. Maybe the nightmares wouldn’t catch them, if they slept during the day.

She didn’t want to bring it up, though. Hank and Clarice might be exhausted, but they looked happy, for the moment at least. Marie wasn’t going to be the one to rain on whatever short parade they had going for them.

There was no answer when she knocked on the door, but that didn’t stop Marie. They’d shared a dorm room for years before the Sentinel war; barging in was sort of second nature. It turned out to be a slight error in judgment, since no sooner had she cracked the door than something large and heavy hit the wall beside it -- a shoe, covered in dry macaroni. 

“Flippin’ hell, Kitty, it’s just me!” Marie yelped. “Lemme in. I’ve got somethin’.”

There was a pause. “Sorry. Old habits die hard. Come on in.”

Kitty’s room was a mess -- a neat trick, considering there wasn’t much in it. At least she looked like she’d gotten some sleep, which hopefully meant she hadn’t done anything particularly evil while everyone was away. Kitty might be able to walk through walls, but not in her sleep.

Marie grabbed the white kitten out of the basket, stroking its head when it mewed in protest. “Shh, little one,” she whispered. “I’ve got you a mama. Hey Kitty,” she said, louder, stepping fully through the door, “you know how I said you needed a white cat?”

Kitty’s bleary eyes sharpened, focusing on the tiny fluffball. She hauled herself upright and scooted across the bed, holding out her arms and making grabby-hands.

“He needs a name,” Marie said, handing her the kitten, which immediately stopped squirming. “And Kitty, I swear, if you call him Mr. Bigglesworth, I’ll never speak to you again.”

“It’s a she,” Hank said helpfully. “Maybe Mrs. Bigglesworth?”

Marie wanted to glare, but had to remind herself it was twenty-four years too early for the reference to make any sense. “Call her somethin’ cute, will you?”

“You can’t name a cat right away, Rogue,” Kitty scolded. “You should know that. You have to wait and see what their personality’s like.” She seemed quite happy to let the kitten, still nameless, chew on the ends of her hair.

Hank set the basket on the bed, letting the rest crawl out. “We were thinking of making your room their home base, for now,” he said. “Have it be the first room they’re familiar with. Since you’re on bed rest for the next few days,” he added, very pointedly, giving her a hard stare.

“You just handed me a basket of kittens,” Kitty said. “You won’t hear any argument from me. Come on, guys,” she said, looking at Anathea’s group, all of whom hung back. “You pet them. Like this.” She stroked the kitten’s head, and the little thing curled up into a ball.

“They bite?” Anathea asked, eyeing her slightly gnawed-on hair.

“Only a little. It doesn’t really hurt -- they’re just playing. Pick one up.”

Anathea hesitated, then reached for a tiny calico. She jumped a little when it squeaked, and picked it up, very carefully.

“They’ll let you know how they want to be held,” Marie said. “If she squirms, try somethin’ else. Clarice, don’t even,” she added, but it was too late --

“That’s what she said.”

“...Dammit, Clarice, you are not settin’ a good example for the kids.” She was only half joking, too; in terms of their total ignorance to the way this world worked, Anathea and her group really were like children. Battle-scarred, traumatized, time-traveling children.

Janek and Irena crept forward, each carefully taking a kitten, inspecting them like they were alien life forms. She looked slightly nervous, but he had an expression Marie wasn’t sure she liked. 

“They’re not food,” she said hastily. “They’re pets. You feed them, and pet them, and they snuggle with you when it’s cold at night.” She didn’t know where it came from, but she had a sudden, horrible vision of him trying to take one apart to see how it worked. Not out of malice -- just because he didn’t know any better. Hurrying, she picked up the ginger kitten and demonstrated.

Comprehension dawned, and he carefully adjusted his hold. Just what in the hell did Magneto have against this kid? It wasn’t like it was a competition sort of situation. All that group from the future -- even Anathea -- _were_ a little creepy, but that was mostly down to their total ignorance of this world. Janek didn’t appear to have a malicious bone in his body. She doubted Kitty would be interested, but even if she was, it was none of his goddamn business, and if he didn’t knock this off, Marie was going to say so. They wanted this group to trust them, after all, and him sitting there looking like he wanted to murder one of them in the spleen was not helpful.

Speak of the fucking devil, apparently he decided to join the festivities. At least Logan was with him: while Logan might not be subtle, he could certainly be effectively distracting when he wanted to. Marie caught his eyes, and he shrugged. 

She moved in closer to Janek, deliberately hovering over his kitten, giving Magneto a pointed glare. He glared right back, and it was all she could do not to make a face at him. The only thing that stopped her was remembrance that she was supposed to be the mature one.

Kitty, who even yet had never actually caught any of his glowers at poor Janek, held up her kitten like she was Simba from _The Lion King_. Most cats wouldn’t have stood for that for more than a second, but hers just kept purring away. “Check her out,” Kitty said. “She doesn’t have a name yet, but just look at her.”

Marie expected him to react to the kitten much like Logan had -- a mix of annoyance and resigned tolerance. So she was quite surprised when he reached out and took the little thing from Kitty, letting it climb up his shoulder and shed all over his dark shirt, only wincing a little when the tiny claws dug through the fabric. 

Huh. Maybe everybody really _did_ have hidden depths. Or it could just be the sleep deprivation.

That thought led her to wondering just how much she was actually going to be able to help with Logan’s nightmares. She didn’t care what eldritch abomination was lurking in his dreams -- _nothing_ could out-stubborn her, when she really set her mind to something. She’d kick its ass, even if she couldn’t actually get into the nightmare itself.

Turning to Logan, she held out her kitten again. The message in her eyes was very clear: _if_ Magneto _can hold a kitten and like it, you can, too._

He didn’t quite roll his eyes, but he came close. Carefully, and rather uncertainly, he took the little critter from her, also letting it scale his shoulder like a tiny, furry mountain climber. The kitten’s purring ratcheted up a notch, and he headbutted Logan’s chin. He looked so uncomfortable that she just barely restrained a laugh. “How about we get these things settled so we can go eat?” he said, side-eyeing the kitten when it chirped in his ear.

Marie _did_ laugh then, carefully taking the little furry ball back. She gave his fuzzy little head a kiss before putting him back on Kitty’s bed. “Come on, y’all,” she said. “Let’s get their litterbox together, and get ’em some food. They’re so young they’ll sleep again soon.”

Anathea’s group watched with rapt fascination as she filled the plastic tub with litter, while Anathea translated all the while. Irena was dispatched to the kitchen to get two bowls, and she must have practically flown, to get back so soon. Once the kittens had food and water, Marie shooed the whole herd out, feeling very much like a mother who had inherited someone else’s children. That was a thought to tuck away for later.

Clarice and Hank were practically staggering with exhaustion, and Raven wasn’t much better. Only Ororo looked even halfway with it, but Marie suspected that was more act than anything else. As for Magneto, he’d dumped all the ‘craft supplies’ off one of the room’s pair of armchairs, sat with the kitten on his chest -- and fallen asleep, the little thing purring in his ear.

She glanced at Kitty, who shrugged. “Might as well let him sleep, as long as he doesn’t have a nightmare and squish my kitten. Though if that cat starts liking him more than she likes me, I might just have to kill him.”

“Good luck,” Marie muttered, following Logan out into the hallway and shutting the door behind her. “Well,” she said, giving him an expectant look.

“Still nothin’,” he said. “From either one. Although I think sayin’ he wants to murder Janek isn’t much of an overstatement.”

“Creepy,” Marie said, shaking her head.

“That’s what I said. C’mon. I’d actually put butter in the pan before Magneto decided he had to go be creepy. Let’s fry some eggs.”

\--

Erik had actually managed a short nap earlier -- very short. It was only twenty minutes before the nightmare found him, and it somehow only served to make him even more tired. It was little wonder he fell asleep again, as soon as he stopped moving long enough.

_This wasn’t_ the _nightmare, but it was_ a _nightmare -- an old, terribly familiar one. The camp was merely a blur, and Shaw little more so, but his mother...no matter how many times he dreamt of his mother’s death, the memory never lost its clarity._

_Mercifully, though, this time it shifted before its true horror could grip him, turning into the bizarre sort of nonsense dreams were normally made of: in this case, a motor-boat floating through a sea of purple clouds, each one with a tiny elephant on its top. The hum of the boat’s engine was somehow both loud and oddly soothing, and -- for a brief while, at least -- he felt something akin to peace._

_It wasn’t to last. The basement called to him again, the darkness gripping him with a strength no amount of resistance could defeat. Even Shaw had never made him feel this helpless, and even through his terror, he hated that, hated every second of it. His fury was the only defense he had against such soul-crushing horror, but it was nowhere near enough -- not when such potent evil tried so hard to steal into him with every breath he took._

He jerked awake, heart lurching into his throat, and immediately winced when four paws’ worth of claws dug into his chest. The kitten stared at him with round, reproachful, sleepy eyes -- apparently he’d woken it up, too.

Kitty stood beside him, cane in hand. He could feel where she’d poked him in the shoulder with it, though she couldn’t have used much force, because it didn’t actually hurt.

“How long have I been asleep?” he asked her, scrubbing a hand over his face.

“A little over an hour.” She looked at him, both curious and assessing. “Did the kitten help at all?”

Erik cracked his neck, wincing. Sleeping half-seated was not terribly comfortable. “Maybe. For a while I dreamed I was piloting a boat through clouds. The engine might have been its purr.”

Kitty bit the inside of her cheek, and he could tell she was trying, so very, very hard, not to laugh. “You’re probably right,” she said. “And she’s a she, not an it.” She paused, thoughtful, and clearly rather torn. “Look, if you tell anyone I was nice to you, I’ll shave your eyebrows,” she said eventually, “but go sleep. I’ve got work to do, and I can do it just as easily on the floor. If one kitten got you an hour, eight of them might actually give you a real night’s rest. During the day, yeah, but...you know what I mean. Shoo, before I change my mind.”

He arched an eyebrow, genuinely startled, but her challenging glare kept him silent. Most of his mind thought her kitten theory was ridiculous, but he wasn’t going to argue. Maybe she was right. However irritating she might be, she wasn’t stupid.

“Thank you,” he said, having to force the words out. There were a number of pipe cleaners scattered among the mass of kittens on her bed, but he didn’t have the energy to ask. Though the dread of his nightmare still lingered, he was so tired that even it couldn’t keep him awake.

\--

Logan would never have taken a nap on his own, and under any normal circumstances, it would probably be impossible to con him into one. Marie, however, was dog-tired, and she knew he had to be, too, so she wheedled him into it by saying she didn’t want to fall asleep by herself. It was manipulative, maybe, but she also wanted to test the Professor’s hypothesis -- and in any event it didn’t seem fair to get rest when Logan couldn’t.

“The things I do for you,” he grumbled, but there was no actual rancor in it. “C’mon. They probably won’t burn the house down with the Professor supervisin’ ’em.”

Marie laughed. “That’s the spirit.” 

She shut the curtains, though not all the way. She had her own hypothesis to test: did sleeping in the dark make it worse? Would the daylight world somehow ease the effects? They’d find out now, one way or another.

Even after only a few days, their somewhat odd sleeping arrangement had become second nature to her. It was so warm right now that she only crawled under the sheet, unable to bear anything more even over her loose cotton pants and thin linen shirt. Ever since she was seventeen years old, she’d hated summer days, but even Logan’s furnace of a body wasn’t going to stop her doing this. She could deal with being a sweat-ball later. Right now she was so tired that no amount of discomfort could keep her awake.

_She wasn’t actually aware of falling asleep, though eventually she realized she was dreaming -- it was impossible not to, considering her current dream involved her and Clarice driving a bedstead down a freeway, shooting zombies with hoses that spewed pink flame retardant. For some goddamn reason, it turned the zombies into kittens. It was weird as hell, but it was somehow restful -- until it shifted, dissolving into darkness._

_Panic gripped her, but it was not her own. Even in her sleep, she could feel Logan tense beside her, and she tried to send him her lingering calm. It was about as useful as spitting in the wind, but she had to try._

_The Professor had said the nightmare would remain separate from her, so when the blackness seized her, it was almost enough to startle her awake. The terror that stabbed her this time was her own, her heart stuttering within her chest -- Christ, she was alone, she was_ alone _with this...this_ thing. __

_No. No, she wasn’t. Logan was beside her, and she knew it, even if she couldn’t feel him. This darkness, this thing, had grabbed him when he’d been in the basement, when he’d disrupted whatever slept their in the waking world, but she hadn’t been. Fuck this thing._

_Burning, red-hot fury took total possession of her, singing in her veins, searing away the terror by sheer intensity. No, she couldn’t find Logan in here, not if it really didn’t want her to, but she_ could _fight for him._

__Mine, _she snarled, though she couldn’t speak the word aloud._ This. One. Is. _Mine._ You get outta his head or I’ll tear you the fuck apart.

_It howled at her, screaming its own rage with a voice so deep she could only feel it, not hear it. It seized her, paralyzed her, took hold of her heart and lungs and_ squeezed, _and oh holy Christ did that_ hurt. _Her stomach juked left, nausea curling through her, horrible icy-velvet softness stealing into her breath, ghosting through her ears --_

_\-- and then it hit the Wall._

_The Professor had named it, all those years ago, when he first taught her to cage the Magneto-echo rattling around in her mind. He had set the foundations, but she’d tended it like a living thing, strengthening it into a barrier of mental titanium. It was very likely one of the few things that had kept her from going completely insane within the camps: she could retreat into a section of it herself, if necessary, hiding in a mental room furnished much like her dormitory when she’d still been at school._

_There were rows and rows of cells behind the Wall, containing the dozens of personalities she’d absorbed over the years. Some were welcome, like Logan, and the echo the Professor had deliberately left to help her, but most of them...Magneto was not the worst personality she’d taken on. In the camps, several times, they’d forced her to kill other prisoners, taking notes on how long it took them to die before whisking them off to autopsy. Some of the poor souls had simply been unlucky enough to be nearby, when a victim was wanted, but others...she’d been given murderers, sadists, some of the lowest dregs of humanity. Without the Professor’s training, they would have driven her mad within days, but even though she’d been weak and starving and in near constant pain, she’d caged them all, building further cells in which they howled, useless._

_Now, though...now she drew this thing, this darkness, straight through the Wall, slamming the door behind them. For a moment she could feel its disorientation, its sheer confusion at this unexpected resistance._

__Okay, guys, _she said, unable to keep the vicious glee out of her voice,_ have fun.

_She opened the cells._ All _of them._

\--

When Logan woke, he had very little memory of dreaming. Unlike all the other times he’d tried to sleep since they landed in New York, the nightmares left no lasting impression -- just a vague, lingering horror. Had whatever the Professor done actually _worked?_

When he opened his eyes, he found Marie staring at him. No, not at him -- though her own eyes were wide, they were completely unfocused, her pupils blown so wide that only a thin ring of brown iris remained. She lay there, unblinking, and if it wasn’t for the fact that his feral senses could hear her pulse -- which was far too rapid -- he would have thought she was dead.

“Marie?” he said, sitting up and shaking her a little. “ _Marie_ , goddammit, say somethin’. C’mon, darlin’, give me a blink.” Panic rose in his chest, every bit as choking as the darkness had been. “ _Shit_.”

He scrambled out of bed and lifted her into his arms -- carefully, trying not to jostle her head. Her expression didn’t change, and she still didn’t blink. The Professor had better be able to fix this, or Logan wouldn’t be responsible for what happened next.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, formless evil -- Rogue might not be able to physically kick ass right now, but you fucked with the wrong mutant.
> 
> I actually outlined the next chapter a week ago, but it’s been proving slightly more difficult, because this is the first one we’ll get from Charles’s perspective. He has proven rather difficult to write, but I think the results will be worth it. I think I’m also going to have to add a platonic form of That Crackship Tag. As Logan puts it, just because it’s not _that_ doesn’t mean it’s not _something_ , even if neither party is particularly interested in admitting it yet.


	19. Asskicking, Odd Friendships, and More Kittens

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Rogue is a mental badass (again), Logan freaks, That Tag is created, and the Professor is wiser than he’s willing to share (yet). My first time writing Charles’s perspective, so I hope I did him justice.
> 
> I'm going out of town tomorrow, and will be gone until Sunday, so I probably won't have as much time to write.

Though Charles refused to pry into the minds of the four in his household plagued by nightmares, he nevertheless kept a mental eye on them -- even Erik, if only to make certain he wasn’t going to murder someone as a result of his dreams. Marie and Logan, however, now warranted special attention, so he felt Logan’s fear and panic quite clearly.

He was in his office, immensely troubled. Though his father had left him a great deal of personal effects, his mother had packed the majority of them away, and Charles had never bothered to sift through them. His father had died when he was so young that Charles had rarely thought of him until he discovered the ‘work’ he’d done for the British government before immigrating to America. Unfortunately for the quartet of sufferers, it meant they were flying by the seat of their pants.

He snapped his book shut, wheeling himself out from behind his desk. Logan was on his way, the force of his dread and mounting anger hitting Charles’s mind like a brick even from this distance. 

“Let me see her,” he said, as soon as Logan had burst through the door. In his arms, Marie’s stare was wide-eyed and vacant, her pallid face expressionless. Logan, by contrast, was terrified, and ready to murder something.

“The fuck did you _do_ , Professor?” he snarled, bending down so Charles could see her. Her mind, he realized, was not blank -- it was merely locked, in a way he didn’t yet understand.

“The question isn’t what _I_ did, but what _she_ did. Give me a moment.”

_He touched Marie’s thoughts, very carefully -- just a brush, to see what he was dealing with. What he found surprised him a great deal._

_The force that caused the nightmares should not have been able to bleed through to her mind. She ought only to have been a companion outside it, a presence Logan that might draw Logan out of it. This..._ this _he hadn’t anticipated._

_He’d checked, before he made the link -- checked her mental stability, and the strength of the cages in which she kept the personalities she’d absorbed. She had a remarkable strength of will for someone without telepathic powers -- she attributed it mostly to the guidance of his older self, but quite a lot of it had to have been simply part of her nature. The horrors she had gone through in the future had not destroyed the ruthless logic at the base of all her thoughts, because it had been necessary to maintain her sense of self._

_So yes, he’d known she was very strong, in the very bedrock of all that made her Marie. He had not, however, suspected she could be capable of_ this. _Just what on Earth had his older self really taught her? As it was now, even_ he _couldn’t do something like this. Which, unfortunately, meant that he wasn’t entirely sure how to fix it. Oh, he had a theory, but it was merely that and nothing more._

 __Marie? _he asked, approaching the Wall. He wasn’t certain he dared breach it yet; he had to know just where she was within her own mind. He was vastly relieved when she responded._

Kinda busy right now, Professor, _she said_. I never have let all these assholes out at once before. They’re havin’ a little too much fun.

Dear God, just what had she done? He knew enough about what she held locked in her mind to think that only sheer desperation could have driven her to release them all at once, even behind her Wall. Can I help you? _he asked -- asked, because he honestly wasn’t quite sure what he could do without her allowing it. Hers was a mind unlike anything he had ever encountered._

 _There was a long pause._ I wanna say yes, _she said,_ but you’ve never seen this mess before. Older you, he helped me when I only had three rattlin’ around in my mind. Now I’ve got thirty-eight.

Let me try, _he said firmly. If his older self could do it, it stood to reason that he had a chance as well._ Let me through the Wall, Marie. Please

_Passing through it was a very strange thing. While the foundations could never have been laid by her, she had added to them, bit by bit, until she created a force any telepath would have a hard time reckoning with._

_The mental landscape behind the wall did look very much like an old-fashioned prison, complete with barred cells. It was also absolutely crawling with people, all of whom were viciously attacking a strange, shadowy figure backed against one bare concrete wall._

_Logan he recognized easily, and Erik and Ororo, but the rest were strangers. Men and women, young and old, and they were, as Marie suggested, apparently having quite a bit of fun. They tore at the figure like rabid dogs, fingers curled into claws, yelling and taunting it the entire while. For some reason, her mental Logan had claws not of bone, but of metal, and each time the figure tried to escape, he slashed it along the torso. Though it didn’t bleed, it let out a strange, low, resonant howl of agony._

_A shade of Ororo struck its empty eyes with lightning, which drew curses of protest from the others, who evidently wished to prolong their freedom as they mauled the newest invader._

Have you ever let them all out before? _he asked, unable to tear his eyes away._

No. I’ve never needed to. I might need your help lockin’ ’em all back up again, once they’ve finished with...that thing. What _is_ it?

I don’t know, _he said, grimly_. Not yet. My father kept my grandfather’s journal, and it’s...not pleasant reading. How long are you going to let this go on?

Until it’s learned its lesson, _she said, with just a touch of vicious satisfaction in her voice._ Logan’s mine. Anythin’ that thinks otherwise is gonna learn that the hard way.

_Could that work? he wondered silently. For Logan, at least, could it really be that simple? If it was, he had one less thing to worry about. While it was blatantly obvious that she loved him, this was a type of devotion Charles hadn’t thought possible. But then, Logan more than likely matched it; out of the entire crowd in her head, he was the one who kept that strange figure from escaping, from worming its way free. The others, even Ororo, were playing a savage game, but he was guarding as well as fighting._

Do you have a strong enough cell to hold it? _he asked._

I think so. Usually, when I first get somebody in my head, they get put in solitary a while, until they learn how to behave themselves. I don’t let ’em out until they stop screamin’. Then they can go talk to the others if they want, and I can listen in, if I feel like it. This one’s just gonna have to stay in solitary forever, and I’ve gotta build a new cell. __

_Oh, how he wished there was some way to do this for all of them, but he was quite sure it was only made possible by the connection she’d already had with Logan. Even Clarice, who was her friend, couldn’t have any kind of bond nearly this strong. If anything was going to work for the others, he’d have to devise a system himself, one based upon Marie’s. Given that he had apparently taught it to her in the future, it had to be possible -- though the thought of going into Erik’s head, even to do that, was repugnant, and one he wouldn’t entertain further until he had to._

_She seemed to have the entire thing well in hand, but he lingered anyway, just in case. Were he ever to find another with her mutation, he would need to know how to do this for them -- in time, at least in theory, her younger self would come to the school with the same problem._

_He watched her construct the new cell, her new ‘solitary’. She didn’t touch it, but her hands moved in a series of gestures that almost had an air of ritual about them. Even without knowledge of how many others shared her mind, it would have been obvious that she was well-practiced at it, raising heavy steel walls and reinforcing them with mental rivets. This cell had no bars: it was a metal box, barely large enough for the creature to lie down in, furnished only with a cot. He wondered if all her new ‘guests’ received such treatment, or if the more welcome ones, like Logan and Ororo, were spared it. The latter was far more likely, he thought._

All right, you guys, that’s enough, _she said._ For now. Stuff that thing in Solitary and go on back now, and if you’re good, I’ll let you out into the yard. __

_To Charles’s immense surprise, once they’d gleefully locked the dark thing away, most of them went -- protesting and grumbling, true, but they still went. Only Logan and Ororo remained free._

We’ll keep an eye on it, _Logan said._ Let you know if it starts doin’ somethin’ stupid. You go sleep now, darlin’. God knows you earned it.

 _Marie gave him a smile, much like the ones she gifted to his physical self._ Thanks, sugar. C’mon, Professor. I need a nap, and Logan needs to know I’m not dead or nuts. Just tell him they were all helpin’ out -- he’ll know what you mean.

I’ll check on you later, _he said, not wanting to leave her to it, but realizing she probably knew what she was doing much better than he did._

He blinked, and found Logan watching him intently, fear still etched in his expression. “What the hell happened?” he demanded, voice rough and harsh.

Charles looked down at Marie, who had closed her eyes and appeared to be merely asleep now. “She took on your nightmare,” he said. “How much do you know about the way she deals with the others in her head?”

Logan brushed the hair back from her forehead, his thumb smoothing out the worried crease between her eyebrows. His tension visibly lessened. “She told me it’s like a prison,” he said, “where she locks up all the others. Did she do that with that -- _thing?_ Because it’s not just another person -- how can she have it caged up in her head, without it gettin’ out?”

“Her mind is quite remarkable,” Charles said. “I’ve never seen anything like it. She’d released all the others, and they attacked the...avatar...into submission. She has it locked now in a room that’s the equivalent of solitary confinement in her mental prison. If I hadn’t seen it myself, I wouldn’t have thought it possible. She said to tell you that you -- the Logan in her head -- were helping her.”

That made Logan smile a little. “’Course I am,” he said. “She’s had a new version of me hop on in there the day we both got here. They get weaker, her personalities, over time, unless she updates ’em.”

If that lot were what Marie considered ‘weak’, Charles wasn’t certain he wanted to know what she counted as strong. “I’d like to have Hank look her over,” he said, “just to be safe. And I’ll want to monitor you both for the next few days, until we know what effect this will have on the source of the nightmares. You might just be the lucky one, out of the four.”

“Five,” Logan said. “Wish there was any way to find out if Trask’s havin’ the same problem. I hope so.”

Privately, Charles agreed. “Whether he is or not, once Marie has recovered, I would like to take another look at her mind,” he said. “If she can show me what I taught her in the future, I may be able to help the others at least try to do the same.”

“You think that’d actually work?” Logan asked, turning to carry Marie over to the sofa under the window. She didn’t stir at all, even when he laid her down -- she had to be utterly exhausted.

“I don’t know. She caught whatever is causing your nightmares, not the other way around. And I don’t know if any of the others have the sheer strength of will. Erik _might_ , but he’s...twisted, and bitter in a way Marie has somehow escaped, despite all her experiences. I know Clarice has seen terrible things, in the future you’ve come from, but they can’t be anything like what Marie endured in the camps.”

“You even _wanna_ help Magneto?” Logan asked, running a hand through Marie’s hair.

Charles sighed. “Honestly? No. But I should, if only because God knows what he’ll do if I let them drive him insane.” It was a legitimate worry, too. After all, the violent course on which he’d first been set had all started with the loss of his mother, and look at all he’d done to avenge her. Given time, he would most likely blame Trask, and the results of that could be as bad as -- or even worse than -- the future they had hopefully averted. “Taunting Clarice and Ororo will only sustain him so far. Once the novelty wears off, I don’t know what he’ll do.”

“He’ll murder that Janek kid in the face, is what he’ll do,” Logan said. “Kid’s kinda got a thing for Kitty, and I dunno if you’ve noticed, but Magneto’s a little weird about her. It’s nothin’ like that, but it’s somethin’. Dunno just what to make of either of ’em, but it’s kinda creepy.”

“I don’t think anyone’s failed to notice that,” he said dryly. While hadn’t gone near Erik’s mind, he’d taken a brief look at Kitty’s, when he was trying to figure out just what was going on there. Underneath several layers of belligerence and irritation, she was somewhat fond of Erik, in an odd way. She’d certainly miss him if he wasn’t around. And it was rather obvious that Erik didn’t like the idea of anything dividing her attention, or he wouldn’t have such a problem with poor Janek. “I’d foster whatever it is they have, if I thought it was anything remotely approaching healthy. I don’t think Erik is even capable of having a healthy friendship, or anything else.” He sighed again. “I probably ought to check on what he’s thinking, much as I don’t want to.”

Logan was quiet a moment. “Y’know,” he said, “you two did mend fences in the future. Yeah, right now he’s a complete asshole, but just remember that he can change. I should know.”

Charles smiled, but there was no humor in it. “Yes, after the world ended. Being hunted would change anyone’s priorities.”

Logan said nothing, which was probably a sign Charles was right. He didn’t feel like checking. Even being within Marie’s mind had been tiring -- no wonder she was so deeply asleep. “I’ll look in on them later. I think I need to rest a while myself. Stay, Logan, if you don’t want to move her. She’s probably going to sleep for a long while yet.”

“I’ll take her back to the room,” Logan said, carefully lifting her. Once again, she didn’t stir at all. “She’ll be more comfortable in her own bed. Do me a favor and don’t pass this around, will you?”

“Of course. I’ll come see her later, if she’s up to it. When she wakes, I need her to see Hank.”

“Gotcha.” Logan left, carefully, and Charles rubbed his temples. 

Could this work? Hank, he knew, had far more mental fortitude than he let on -- or perhaps even than he suspected. Clarice he was less certain of, but a weak-minded person couldn’t have survived so long in the sort of future her group came from. Erik had a will of iron, but mentally he was so twisted already that Charles feared attempting to teach him that method of containment would only make him worse. Not for the first time did he bitterly regret ever teaching Erik how to gain such control over his ability.

But left alone long enough, he really _would_ , Charles was sure, begin to blame Trask. And, short of putting him a coma or outright killing him, there would be no stopping him hunting the bastard down. Oh, Erik wouldn’t be showy about killing him, wouldn’t use it to further his ‘mutant cause’; whatever else he might be, he wasn’t stupid. But murdering Trask might still have disastrous consequences in the future, and Charles wasn’t willing to risk it. 

Having Kitty around really did help, odd though it seemed. The things her devious little brain came up with actually kept him entertained, if nothing else, but Charles thought there might be more to it than that: every one of the people who had come back in time with her were incredibly belligerent to Erik, but she was the only one who acted that way to him because of who he was _now_ , rather than the man he’d been in their future. When she looked at him, she no longer saw the man who’d tried to murder Marie -- instead she saw the man who’d been obnoxious enough to throw garlic bread at her immediately after she’d been hit by a car. Trust Erik to find that...charming, or whatever it was he thought. Charles really didn’t want to know, though he was sure he was going to have to find out.

Fostering their strange, aggravated fondness might be a good thing, but he couldn’t act like he condoned it -- nor could anyone else, he was sure. Not, he thought, that anybody was likely to. It was, as Logan said, a little creepy. But as long as Erik didn’t _actually_ hurt Janek, it might be beneficial. In a very, very, _very_ strange way.

\--

When Erik woke again, just before the nightmare could grip him a third time, it was because a kitten bit the end of his nose.

He blinked, momentarily unaware of where he was, or why the hell he was covered in kittens. Seven out of the eight had crowded onto his chest while he slept, some sleeping, some merely sitting -- if they’d decided to crawl on his face, he probably would have been suffocated by the sheer volume of fuzz.

“I think they like you.” 

He sat up on his elbows, trying not to displace his furry chest-warmer. Kitty was still on the floor, the white cat in her lap. It was chewing on a pipe cleaner while she carefully duct-taped slender wooden barbecue skewers into a rather complex mobile.

“How long was I out?” he asked, trying to rub his face, only to have a kitten grab his hand and bite his thumb.

“About three hours. Guess my hypothesis needs work. Stop that, you,” she said, catching her kitten as it tried to chew on the end of a skewer. “Seriously, though, if they start to like you more than they like me, I’m going to have to do something drastic.”

“Like what?” he asked, prying the little furballs off his shirt, one by one, so he could actually sit up. “Are you really willing to violate the cease-fire because a litter of cats likes me better?” Well, it did sound like the sort of thing she’d do. She was, after all, a tiny bit mad.

“I don’t know, and maybe,” she retorted. “Kittens are serious business. Although, speaking of that, it’s your turn to go to work on Clarice and Ororo. I left some presents in the rooms next door, but I can’t keep leaving these critters to go torment somebody else.”

It took a little effort, but he finally managed to disentangle the last claw from a loose thread on his shirt. “Did you honestly just call them ‘critters’?” he asked witheringly. “ _Americans_.”

“Stuff it,” Kitty said. “Look at this little face and tell me it’s not a critter.” She picked up her kitten and scratched it under the chin. Its purr was so loud he’d swear he could feel it reverberating through his teeth. 

“It’s still not a _critter_ ,” he said, unable to keep the derision out of his tone -- not that he bothered trying. “What on Earth are you making?” He pointed at the duct tape-and-skewer...thing...sitting by her feet.

“It’s a cat mobile. I’m going to tie bits of yarn and crap on it, so they have something to play with. Thank God the Professor never chucked all the old classroom supplies.”

Erik shook his head. He wasn’t nearly awake enough to be processing her chatter. He needed food, and a lot of aspirin. “Has anyone mentioned dinner?” he asked, half hoping she’d say no -- he’d much rather be able to make his own food in peace, if that was even possible in this madhouse. A mansion this size should not feel crowded when it held only seventeen people.

“Not yet. All I know is Hank said he wanted to try cooking on his own tonight, so God help us all.” She set the kitten down, unhooking one of its claws from her hair first, and hauled herself to her feet. The mobile she stashed in the closet, out of reach of tiny paws or teeth. “I mean, he’s a scientist, he knows how to measure ingredients, but there’s a lot more to cooking than that.”

What Erik had seen of Hank in the last days hadn’t done much to inspire confidence. He’d been a brilliant, insecure, twitchy kid eleven years ago, and he was a brilliant, insecure, twitchy man now. Thought of him cooking was slightly disturbing. “If he’s beaten us to the kitchen, I’m making a sandwich,” he said. “And if you slow me down, I’ll leave you to the kittens.”

“Find me my skateboard and I’ll find you something pretty to stick in Ororo’s hair,” she countered, picking up the kitten that was trying to scale her pant leg.

“Something pretty would somewhat defeat the purpose,” he pointed out. “Find me an utterly hideous piece of jewelry, and we might have a deal.”

Kitty shrugged, and limped to the door. “Fair enough. Now, we’re going to have to make this fast, before they notice, or they’ll run into the door once we’ve left.” 

“You make it sound like they’re stampeding wolves,” he said dryly.

“A herd of kittens isn’t far off,” she said, her against the door. “And yes, I know the technical term is ‘litter’, but they move in herds. Let’s go.” She dragged him through the door without any further warning -- something he would probably never get used to. It felt so very, very odd -- it tingled, much like a limb that had gone to sleep and was now just waking. A chorus of protesting meows could be heard through it, and she winced. “Sorry, guys. I’ll be back. Don’t eat my bed while I’m gone.”

Erik rolled his eyes. “They’re not your children.”

“Says you. You try taking care of a kitten and not thinking of it as a baby.”

“You,” he said, as she limped along, “are a very, very strange person.”

Kitty snorted. “And you’ve just now figured that out? Anyway, you’re one to talk. You threw goddamn bread at me after I got hit by a shitty French driver. Everything that came after is your fault.”

“‘Shitty French driver’ brings to mind a few images I’d rather not have right before eating,” he said, more dryly still.

Kitty paused, grimacing. “Thanks for pointing that out,” she muttered. “You know, I saw a picture once -- years ago, before the world went to hell -- of a group of cheerleaders at some sports game. They’d tossed a girl up in the air and she shit her pants on the way up, so it was this big stream --”

“Stop,” Erik said, slightly nauseated. “Just stop. The prospect of twitchy scientist cooking is bad enough, without that particular piece of mental torment.”

She looked at him, and burst out laughing. “Your face,” she said, wincing a little as she touched her ribs. “You’re green. You’re actually fucking _green_.” She giggled so hard she started hiccuping.

Anathea and her group chose that moment to round the corner, moving, as Kitty would say, very like a herd. She blinked at Kitty, though _Alfred_ , (thank you, Logan, for that irresistible inflection) scowled like thunder.

“Don’t ask,” Erik said. “Just...don’t.”

That aggravating boy, Janek, was trying to sidle forward, but very wisely thought better of it. Sooner or later, Kitty was going to realize just how viciously Erik glared at the kid, and would wonder just what the hell he was doing. The truth was, he didn’t _know_. Logan was right: he genuinely had no interest in her, but somehow, the thought of anyone else actually doing so was...irritating. The fact that he didn’t know _why_ was equally annoying.

Kitty herself often irritated him. She could be such a child (though, if he were perfectly honest, plenty of his own actions the last few days were hardly those of a mature adult), her devious little brain was more than a bit evil, and she appeared to have no respect for him whatsoever. She could also be rather more insightful than he was strictly comfortable with, she didn’t seem to possess anything like a verbal filter, and the glee she took in insulting him bordered on unholy. 

And yet, he rather liked her. Maybe ten years in solitary had cracked his mind a little.

Whatever the reason, the Janek boy needed to be put in his place. Unfortunately, he seemed to understand very little English, so impressing that upon him might prove difficult.

 _Alfred_ muttered something, and Anathea shot him a scowl. Erik recalled how Amal had covered his mouth after he’d laughed the other day, a flash of panic in his expression. Was that _Alfred’s_ fault? Somebody needed to ask Anathea just what his position was in her group’s hierarchy, and why he was such a killjoy. 

“If you say so,” Anathea said, shaking her head. “Kitty, should you actually be walking?”

“Nope,” Kitty said, still snickering, “but Logan took my skateboard, so it’s all his fault.”

Anathea gave her a look of total incomprehension. “Wait, that thing you sit on before you go to the hospital?”

“Yeah. I was doing just fine with it.”

“The past is a strange, strange place,” Anathea said. “But dinner wait.”

“I _hope_ it’s dinner,” Kitty muttered, limping along again. “I’m not going to eat anything cooked on a Bunsen burner.” 

Aggravating as it was to walk so slowly, Erik kept pace with her -- mostly to keep Janek from getting any ideas, but also to watch _Alfred._ His nose was still a bruised mess, one of his lips quite spectacularly split -- Logan had done a number on him, but Erik didn’t think that entirely explained his perpetual hostility. It certainly shouldn’t have made his own group react to him as they did. They were somewhat cowed around him, in a way Erik had seen before, as a child. Those were not memories he cared to examine.

When they reached the kitchen, Logan and Marie were both absent, but Charles, annoyingly, was not. Oh, according Logan, he and Charles had regained some measure of friendship in the future, but Erik couldn’t imagine how. The why was fairly obvious -- if there were so few mutants left, they couldn’t afford to be enemies -- but still. They could easily have become allies without any measure of friendship. Charles seemed to hate him with every fiber of his being, which made Erik wonder just what in the hell had happened to him in the last decade. The man he’d known had been optimistic to a fault.

Unfortunately for all of them, Hank was indeed at the stove, and the odor of something burnt emanated from the oven. Wonderful. At least Ororo was hovering beside him, evidently trying to mitigate the damage.

“Dammit, Kitty,” he said, to Erik’s surprise -- never had he heard the man curse. “You aren’t supposed to be walking.”

“Oh, save it,” she sighed. “I’ve been sitting with the kittens all day. A trip to the kitchen won’t kill me.”

He looked like he wanted to argue, but must have decided it wasn’t worth it. “Fine,” he said. “But I need to check your ribs after dinner.”

“Of course you do,” she muttered. “Okay. But I’m sure they’re fine.”

“I’ll be the judge of that. Go. Sit.”

She did, surprisingly without protest. It made Erik deeply suspicious.

\--

Kitty didn’t protest because her ribs and her leg did actually hurt like a bitch, but she was hardly going to let Hank know. She’d be fine after some aspirin. Having spent so long in a future that rarely had even basic painkillers, she honestly didn’t see what the problem was. Compared to some of the things they’d all gone through for the last several years, it wasn’t _that_ bad. But Hank wouldn’t understand, even if she explained it, so she didn’t bother trying. 

Ororo brought out two big bowls of salad, which were the cause of much interest in Anathea’s group. If they’d never seen fresh vegetables, Kitty wondered how they hadn’t all died of scurvy ages ago. Three pizzas came next -- slightly singed, but not the lumps of charcoal she’d been expecting. Her group would hardly care, and she doubted Anathea’s would, either. Food was food. It didn’t mean you were going to like it, but it was that or starve.

“Where are Rogue and Logan?” she asked, grabbing some salad.

The Professor hesitated. His older self wouldn’t have, but apparently, at this age, he hadn’t yet mastered evasiveness. “Rogue isn’t feeling well,” he said. “It’s related to the basement. I need to talk to the rest of you after dinner.”

Kitty glanced at Clarice, who had visibly paled, and Magneto, whose expression was so neutral he might as well have been a statue. Though Hank was still near the oven, he swallowed audibly. 

_Poor guys,_ she thought. Part of her felt terrible for leaving more presents for Clarice and Ororo to find, another part wondered if the distraction -- of that series of small, irritating pranks -- wasn’t partly a good thing. She’d ask Ororo later. Clarice was still her friend, after all: if she was truly miserable already, Kitty couldn’t go adding to that. And if she had to kick Magneto to get him to agree to that, she’d do it. 

It might not come to that, though, seeing the toll his own nightmares were taking. Out of the four, he didn’t have anyone to poke him awake, and since nobody was likely to volunteer for the job, she ought to do it. She wasn’t _completely_ heartless, no matter what Clarice and Ororo might think at the moment. And her kitten hypothesis wasn’t without merit: he had managed a solid three hours, which she suspected the others rarely accomplished.

They all had nightmares, in the future, but none of them were like _this_. In theory, both she and Ororo knew how to deal with them, how to take care of other people who had them, but given Clarice’s poor shape, it would seem that their experience wasn’t enough. Unlike Ororo, Kitty was not exactly the most nurturing person in the world -- but then, Magneto was nothing like Clarice. Poking him with the cane and dropping kittens on him would probably go over far better with him than they would with her.

She caught the Professor looking at her, and gave him a small shrug. He’d know she meant well, even if the others would think she was just in it to torture Magneto.

 _I’d like to talk to you later_ , he said. _You and Ororo and Raven. I think I know how you can help._

Kitty nodded, very slightly. _That_ was probably going to be an interesting conversation.

\--

Marie didn’t wake until well after seven. Logan had been stroking her hair the whole time, dozing sightly without actually sleeping. Her steady heartbeat and even breathing had calmed him -- whatever she’d done earlier, she was truly asleep now.

She blinked at him sleepily, and smiled a little. “You okay, sugar?”

“I should be askin’ you that,” he said, carefully tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “Professor said you had a lot to do, earlier.”

Her smile widened, though it was still tired. “I did. Never though everybody in my head would come in handy, but they sure as hell did today. Thing that was after you got a lesson it won’t forget in a hurry.”

He wanted to scold her, to tell her what she’d done was dangerous as hell and she never should have tried it, but it would be patronizing, and he knew it. Marie was no dummy -- she wasn’t the type to bite off more than she could chew. And she was strong in ways he knew he couldn’t comprehend. If she wanted to go out on a limb for him, he had no choice but to let her, because he’d do the same for her, and more. “Professor wants Hank to check you over,” he said instead. “Just to make sure whatever the hell you did didn’t hurt you in some way.”

“I’m just tired,” she sighed. “And kinda hungry. No, scratch that -- I’m starvin’. Don’t think I could handle goin’ down to dinner, though.”

“Dinner’s over. I’ll make you somethin’ Hank can wait until tomorrow.”

“He’s gonna have to. Think I could sleep another twelve hours at least.”

He let his fingers hover over her face, almost but not quite touching. “You stay, darlin’. I’ll bring you somethin’.”

She gave him a sleepy smile, before her eyes drifted shut again. Yeah, she was strong, his Marie. If anybody was going to fight whatever lurked in that basement and actually win, it was her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Go Rogue, go! Logan has not seen the last of his nightmares, though he _has_ moved past the worst. The rest of them aren’t so lucky. It won’t be over for any of them until the full source of all that evil is dealt with. Meanwhile, Erik and Kitty have to deal with the realization that they do not, in fact, hate each other, no matter how annoying each thinks the other might be.


	20. Go the Fuck to Sleep

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Operation Kitten Sleep is implemented, Logan is introspective, nocturnal visitations happen, and Kitty tells the world’s most profane bedtime story.
> 
> I am headed out of town today, so next update will probably be on Sunday.

Ororo wondered just what the Professor was thinking of now. She could do no more than wonder, because this younger Charles was still not someone she knew how to read well. Oh, she could see flashes of the man he would become one day, but they were not enough to allow her to guess much of what was in his mind.

Raven, who had known him much longer, looked equally baffled -- though Kitty, surprisingly, did not. _Worried_ , yes, but not nearly so confused.

They met in the Professor’s office, the night air still warm through the open windows. Ororo and Raven each took one of the huge armchairs, but Kitty curled up on the couch. She was still, Ororo noticed, favoring her left leg as well as her side. No doubt Hank was wishing he could duct-tape her to something she couldn’t just phase right through.

“Why are we here, Charles?” Raven asked. “What have you learned about the nightmares, that you’d want us, and not the people having them?”

Again he hesitated, and Ororo could tell he was searching for the right words. “Marie accomplished something with Logan,” he said. “Something I would not have thought possible. Ororo, Kitty, do you know how she cages the personalities she absorbs?”

“You taught her that,” Ororo said. “It wasn’t easy.”

“I know. I’ve taken a look at her...system...and I believe I can replicate it -- to an extent. Each mind is unique, and she’s had years of practice. 

“Now, Hank I know very well. He’s much stronger than he thinks he is, but he’s still going to need support. I haven’t looked into Clarice’s mind very often -- only to verify that she was who she said she was, and to assess the toll the nightmares might be taking on her. I will need to examine her more closely, but Ororo, I would like you to talk to her about it. I know that she knows my future self well, but most of you aren’t quite certain what to make of me now,” he said, a little dryly.

Ororo winced a little, but there was no point in denying it. “I will,” she said. “At this point I think she’d do anything to make them stop, but I’d like to set her at ease as much as I can, first. She does trust you, but for much of her life she’s seen your older self as a kind of father figure. The fact that you’re now not much older than she is is something she’s had a difficult time reconciling.”

She wasn’t the only one, either. Ororo herself was much older than this Professor, and she wondered if that fact would ever cease to seem strange to her. Oh, someday he would become the Professor she’d known for so long, but she’d be very old herself by then.

“Kitty, I know that you and Erik don’t seem to agree on...well, anything, but you’re the only one he’s likely to actually _listen_ to. No, hear me out,” he said, when she opened her mouth. “He wouldn’t have anything to do with you if he didn’t have a measure of respect for you. He might spend much of his time insulting you, but you’re the only person he actually _talks_ to any more than is absolutely necessary. If all else fails, I don’t doubt you could annoy him into it.”

“...True,” she said, after a thoughtful pause. “But he also could just run off and sulk on his own. Something tells me he’s probably good at that.”

Raven tried to cough back a laugh, and utterly failed. Ororo wondered just what _that_ was about.

“He might,” the Professor conceded, with a small, dry smile, “but I doubt he will. Erik is...something of a show-off. He needs an audience. If he’s going to sulk, he’ll do it where you can see him. If he’s being insulted, it means someone is paying attention.”

“A show-off?” Kitty snorted. “Gee, I hadn’t noticed. I’ll give it a shot. As annoying as he is, I _do_ feel sorry for him. Oh,” she added, glancing around the room, “kittens seem to help. Probably nobody is going to like this idea, but maybe we should try having everyone crash in the same room, so the kittens can go sleep on them.”

Ororo really, really didn’t want to know how she’d found that out. Odd though it was, the thought of them in an actual relationship was somehow _less_ creepy than...whatever the hell they were. 

“I’ll talk to Clarice about it,” she said, shelving that thought. “Having more people in the room might help. She’s said one of the horrible things about the nightmare is how alone she always is.”

“Hank’s said the same thing,” Raven said. “I’ll see what he wants, too. But Kitty, do you really think Erik would go for something like that?”

Kitty was quiet a moment, turning that over. “Under any other circumstances, I’d say no,” she said at last, “but he’s...really goddamn desperate, even if he doesn’t want to show it. What I’m really wondering is if we could talk Rogue and Logan into it.”

It was a good question. Both were such private people, and Rogue had always been somewhat afraid to sleep near other people -- occasionally even her roommates. But she was also very caring, and Clarice was her friend. If they could talk her into it, Logan would follow, simply because he would probably never let her sleep without him ever again.

Once upon a time, there had been people that disapproved of the two, even though there was nothing like that between them yet. Rogue’s age was the most common argument, even when she was in her early twenties. It mostly came from people who didn’t know them well, people who thought Logan was somehow taking advantage of her. 

The team knew better -- though Logan would never show it, he practically worshiped the ground she walked on, and would have done absolutely anything to keep her safe. Ororo had seen him stab himself through the shoulders with his own claws to save Rogue, and he hadn’t yet known her a week. Had Ororo actually believed in soulmates, she might have thought that was what the two were. Certainly, she couldn’t imagine one without the other -- and she doubted they could, either.

“Let me ask,” the Professor said. “I need to assess her mental state, before we could make any plans in that area. What she did was...extraordinary, but I don’t know the toll it will have taken on her. She herself said she’d never done anything quite like it before.”

“If you think she’s not up to it, you’re going to have to be very firm when you tell her so,” Ororo said. “Otherwise she’ll try it anyway. She’s...kind of stubborn.”

The Professor actually laughed. “I’d noticed. Very well. Go talk to your people, and I’ll look in on Marie.”

Ororo wondered just how she was going to present this to Clarice. Given how exhausted the poor girl was, she would probably agree to almost anything.

\--

Marie, who had polished off two salami sandwiches and a beer, was sound asleep when the Professor turned up. Logan met him in the hallway, not wanting to wake her.

“I want to check her mind,” the Professor said. “The things she accomplished today were nothing short of amazing -- and I don’t say that lightly -- but who knows what the aftermath will be like for her. It might be better if I do it while she’s asleep, so that she can’t attempt to hide any negative effects from me.”

He was probably right. Logan knew that his future self had a difficult time finding Marie in the middle of all the other people in her head, but Logan had a suspicion she made it harder on purpose. If the Professor had a look while she was sleeping, he probably would get a better picture of what was actually going on.

“I doubt you could wake her up if you tried,” he said, standing aside to let the Professor wheel himself in.

He tried to stay quiet while the Professor did his thing, but the longer it went on, the longer he worried. The Professor didn’t seem concerned -- Logan would have smelled it, if he was -- but still. This was Marie, and Logan would worry if he damn well felt like it.

After what seemed like half an eternity, the Professor blinked. “I think she’ll be fine,” he said. “She may suffer a period of short-term memory loss, but it will pass. I wanted to talk to both of you, but I can always speak to her about this later. Kitty has an idea that if the four of you stay in one room, it might mitigate the nightmares, and I don’t think the idea is without merit.”

Logan blinked. “You wanna stick me, Clarice, Hank, and _Magneto_ all in the same room?” he asked. If it was anyone but the Professor, he’d think it was a joke.

“And your...watchers,” the Professor said, with a serenity much more like his older self. “Marie, Ororo, Raven, and Hank. I’d like to stay as well, to monitor them.”

Logan wanted to say that was the stupidest idea he’d ever heard of, but this was the Professor. In all the time Logan had known him, in the future and now, he’d never had any ideas that were actually stupid. Confusing, and weird as fuck, but never _stupid_. And...well, hell. Logan had fought alongside Clarice for the last few years, and he owed it to future-Hank to try for his sake, too. If Magneto had to come along for the ride...well, whatever. No skin off Logan’s nose.

“I’ll talk to Marie about it tomorrow,” he said. “It’s her choice.” Except he was sure he already knew what she’d choose. Dammit.

“We’ll see if there’s any effect at all, tonight,” the Professor said. “If it works, even a little, her presence might make a great deal of difference. That darkness...it knows her, now. More importantly, it fears her.”

 _Like it should_ , Logan thought, with grim satisfaction. 

The Professor looked at him curiously. “You do know why she did it, don’t you? Why she was willing to go to such lengths?”

He did, though he didn’t know that he could ever say so aloud. In so many ways, he was absolutely shit with words -- but at least Marie knew that, knew what he felt without needing to hear him speak the words. “Yeah,” he said, uncomfortable. “She knows I’d do the same for her. As much as I wanna tell her off for it, for puttin’ herself in danger like that, I know I can’t. In some ways, she’s as bad with words as I am. We’ve gotta show it, instead.”

“I know,” the Professor said, with a small smile. “You don’t have my gift -- you can’t see what I did. You’re far luckier than most.” 

“Don’t I know it,” Logan said. “Thanks for checkin’ on her, Professor.”

“You’re quite welcome. I’ll look in on her when she’s awake, just to be sure. Good night, Logan.”

“’Night, Professor.”

When he’d gone, Logan wondered just what he’d meant, saying Logan was luckier than most. Oh, it was true, but something in his tone -- the Professor in the future had never mentioned anybody special, and Logan wondered now if it was a subject too painful to share. Not like he could ever ask. Logan might be tactless as hell sometimes, but even he knew there were certain lines best not crossed.

He stretched out next to Marie, watching her. Her face wasn’t quite so bony, but her features were still far too sharp. At least her expression was peaceful -- whatever she was dreaming about, the thing she’d taken from him didn’t seem to be influencing it.

He reached out, fingers hovering just above her cheek. While he wished like hell he could touch her -- that he could show her just how damn beautiful she was -- he knew that even if he never could, it would still be enough. And if, somewhere down the line, she got some ideas in her head...well, he could be creative. It wasn’t like he hadn’t thought about ways around that little issue long before now.

She needed to heal, though, and not just physically. She’d been through hell -- right now, she just needed him to be with her. And he’d stay until the world ended, if it came to that.

\--

Kitty highly doubted Ororo and Raven were having the problems she currently was. Unsurprisingly, Magneto didn’t want to hear a word of it.

“Why in _hell_ would I agree to that?” he demanded, trying to pry a kitten off his shoulder, and failing utterly. “It was Charles’s idea, wasn’t it?”

“Actually, it was mine,” she retorted, completely exasperated. “What, are you afraid someone’s going to slit your throat while you’re asleep? Newsflash: if any of us had actually wanted to murder you, we could have done it days ago. We all managed to stick it out in the hotel room.”

“Yes, and look how much fun _that_ was,” he said sardonically, giving up on the kitten. It was the little calico, who started biting his ear. The sight was so funny it was all Kitty could do to keep a straight face. Laughing right now would help nothing.

All right, he had a point there. Still. “Do you actually want to be stuck dealing with that shit on your own _again?_ ” she asked, wincing as her own kitten climbed her leg to sit in her lap. “Or...wait. You don’t want anyone else to see you having a nightmare, do you?”

He said nothing, but scowled, which was all the answer she needed.

“What are you afraid of? It’s not like they aren’t going through the same thing. Even I don’t give you shit for that, and sure as hell nobody else will.” Was he seriously worried about that? _Seriously?_ Apparently she’d vastly underestimated his insecurity. “Let me put it this way,” she said. “They get all the kittens.”

It was a shot in the dark, one she hadn’t expected to actually work -- but to her surprise, he seemed to be considering that, even as he tried to get the calico away from his ear. “Why, exactly, are you so adamant about this?”

“Because I’m not a completely heartless asshole. There’s kind of a difference between throwing croutons at you and letting something try to eat your brain every time you go to sleep.” She meant it, too. Pissing him off was fun; watching him fall apart because of nightmares was not.

It was, perhaps, that honesty that got him. “Fine,” he said, grabbing the calico. “But if this doesn’t work, I’m blaming you.”

“I think I can deal with that. Come on -- we’re supposed to be setting up one of the rooms.” It was, as a matter of fact, the room she had shared with Rogue and Jubilee, in what seemed like a lifetime ago. She really, really hoped that would somehow help.

\--

It didn’t take any effort at all to talk Clarice around, and not just because their room stank like rancid mayonnaise (thank you, Kitty). Now that there seemed to be a temporary lack of any risk of croutons, she was more than grateful to stay closer to the others. Ororo hadn’t realized just how very afraid she was of being alone.

“And there’s kittens,” she said, hugging her pillow. “You can never go wrong with kittens. Unless you’re allergic to them.”

It only took one trip to move all their things -- sooner or later, they really needed to go shopping for a few more clothes. Ororo recognized the room well, in spite of the fact that its decor was much different.

An assortment of mattresses had been dragged in, and were laid out around the floor -- probably to make it easier for the kittens. Half of them had been made up, and there was a large pile of bedding next to the door. A discordant chorus of meowing came from a box next to the bathroom, and through the door she could see that someone had already laid out their food and water, as well as the litterbox. Three fragrant cups of coffee sat on a nightstand, next to a full pot -- no doubt for the watchers. Having had so little sleep last night, she was going to need it, and was probably going to sleep tomorrow away. Raven snuck up and stole one, before resuming her place beside Hank.

Maybe, just maybe, this would work. It was such a weird plan that perhaps the malevolence from the basement wouldn’t know what to do with it.

Clarice was so exhausted that she passed out as soon as they’d got her bed made up. Hank wasn’t far behind, but Magneto, the stubborn bastard, seemed to be trying desperately hard not to nod off.

Kitty sighed, releasing the horde of kittens. She grabbed the little calico and stuck it on his chest. The rest of them crept around, exploring the room, sniffing everything in sight. A little black-and-white one decided Clarice’s hair was a wonderful bed -- it kneaded her braid for a moment, before curling up and purring like a lawnmower.

“Look,” she said. “Kitten. I’ll even tell you a bedtime story.”

He glared at her, not dignifying that with a response. Kitty’s responding grin could only be called shit-eating. 

“The cats nestle close to their kittens,  
The lambs have laid down with the sheep.  
You’re cozy and warm in your bed, my dear.  
Please go the fuck to sleep.”

Ororo choked on her own spit, but Raven choked on her coffee, almost snorting it out through her nose. Trust Kitty to have memorized that damn story. Magneto just stared at her as though she’d lost her mind.

“The windows are dark in the town, child.  
The whales huddle down in the deep.  
I’ll read you one very last book if you swear  
You’ll go the fuck to sleep.”

Raven _did_ shoot coffee out her nose then, and Ororo had to clap her hands over her mouth to stifle her laughter. Hank and Clarice were so exhausted that they didn’t even stir, fortunately.

“Are you _serious_ ,” Magneto said, and it wasn’t a question. His expression was one of total disbelief, as if he honestly could not comprehend what he was hearing.

Kitty was very obviously trying so very, very hard not to laugh. Ororo wondered how long she could keep this up.

“The eagles who soar through the sky are at rest  
And the creatures who crawl, run, and creep.  
I know you’re not thirsty. That’s bullshit. Stop lying.  
Lie the fuck down, my darling, and sleep.”

Ororo bit her fist, while Raven covered her face, shoulders shaking with silent laughter. Kitty was still, somehow, managing a more or less straight face.

“The wind whispers soft through the grass  
The field mice, they make not a peep.  
It's been 38 minutes already, Jesus Christ  
What the fuck? Go to sleep!”

Ororo never, ever thought she’d see the day _Magneto_ laughed. It was more of a choke than an outright laugh, but it was there, try though he did to hide it.

 

“All the kids from daycare are in dreamland  
The froggy has made his last leap.  
Hell no, you can't go to the bathroom  
You know where you can go? The fuck to sleep!”

That did it. That actually, really did it. He burst out laughing, covering his face with one hand, as though ashamed he’d fallen so far. He didn’t even seem to mind the kitten, which sank its claws into his shirt in an effort to maintain its balance.

Kitty had to pause, trying to rein in her own snickering.

“The owls fly forth from the treetops  
Through the air they soar and they sweep.  
The hot, crimson rage fills my heart, love  
For real: shut the fuck up and sleep.”

She lost it after that, and so did Ororo, completely unable to smother her laughter. Even now, Hank and Clarice didn’t wake, though he did turn over.

Magneto appeared to have entirely given up. He must have figured that if he had to surrender his dignity, he might as well enjoy himself along the way. “What,” he managed, eventually, “the _hell_ was that?”

“A bedtime story,” Kitty said, not bothering to add, _duh._

“Logan is going to be so, so sorry he missed this,” Ororo said, when she could finally speak. 

“Hey, there’s a lot more,” Kitty said. “I can always finish it tomorrow.”

“Oh God, do you have to?” he groaned, somehow sounding pained even through his residual laughter.

“If you go the fuck to sleep, you won’t have to find out until tomorrow, now will you?”

\--

Apparently, the ten years Erik had spent in prison had been Life’s chance to turn his existence into a total farce. He’d just listened to the world’s most profane bedtime story while a kitten kneaded him like bread dough. The worst part, though was, that it had been _funny_. So much for his dignity.

Still, it had the intended effect. He was certainly no longer _tense_ after that, and right now he was too tired to even be embarrassed. That, he was quite sure, would come later. If he managed a few hours’ worth of sleep between then and now, so much the better.

_His dreams, at first, were nothing tremendously unusual, though this one was quite bittersweet. He sat in the treehouse his father had built him as a small child, high in the branches of the ancient elm tree behind their house. Though he was alone, it was tranquil rather than unsettling, and so vivid he fancied he could feel the cool dawn breeze on his face._

_“You have to go back, my child.”_

_He turned around, and saw his mother standing behind him -- his mother has she had been before the camp, her hair a rich auburn like his, her blue eyes alive and calm. “You must return to France. It is the only way you will ever free yourself of this thing.”_

_Deep, childish terror filled him at the very thought. How could he return? How could he ever dare enter that malevolent darkness again? “Going once...infected me,” he said, unable to do more than whisper. “If I went into that pit again, how will it not kill me?”_

_She stepped toward him, kneeling and taking his face in her work-worn hands. “Because you will not go alone. You all must return. Now -- now it separates you all, each night. None of you can fight it on your own.”_

_“And how am I to convince the others of that?” he asked, suddenly feeling very, very young again. “They won’t listen to me.”_

_“You are not the only one being visited tonight,” she said. “I cannot keep your nightmare from you. But know that you are not alone in it. The others are_ there, _even if you cannot feel them.”_

_He wanted to ask her to stay, wanted so badly he could taste it, but even within the dream, he knew that was impossible. Sooner or later the darkness would drag him down, and no amount of insane bedtime stories or fluffy kittens would be able to do a damn thing. He was as helpless now as he’d been when he was a boy, when Shaw murdered his mother in front of him._

_He wouldn’t be helpless. Not anymore._

_\--_

_Marie was dreaming, too._

_She didn’t know where she was. The cabin, so rustic, had to be very old, the walls and floor made of wood smoothed and polished by the passage of decades. The scent of honeysuckle hung heavy in the evening air, hot and humid as only the South could be. She sat at a table, a young woman across from her._

_The woman looked quite familiar, though Marie couldn’t place her. Their facial features were quite similar, suggesting that she was dreaming of some relative she couldn’t recall meeting._

_“Um, hi,” she said, awkward. “Where am I?”_

_The woman smiled. “Guess you wouldn’t remember, huh? Only time you were here was when you were just a baby. I lived here, before I moved into town when you were four.”_

_Marie blinked. Her grandmother had moved into a small apartment when she was four years old. “Are you tryin’ to tell me you’re my granny?” she asked._

_“Not tryin’ to tell you anythin’. There’s things you need to hear, and I’m the only one that can tell you.”_

_This was...bizarre. After all, somewhere out there at this moment, her granny was still alive, and probably kicking something. “What d’you mean?”_

_“The thing in the basement,” her granny said, which made her freeze. “You bloodied its nose somethin’ fierce, but it knows just what he means to you now, and it’ll fight like buggery to use him to punish you. Y’all need to go back there, and y’all need to go down there this time. That Professor of yours has some more readin’ to do.”_

_She reached out and laid a hand on Marie’s, which wasn’t wearing a glove. Marie instinctively tried to recoil, but her granny just shook her head. “Stop bein’ so afraid of yourself. You do what you need to, and you take that girl, Anathea, and her people with you.” She paused. “Marie, one more thing. You might not all survive. You be careful now, and you keep ’em all close. Y’all need to survive, because you know you’re gonna have to make that school later.”_

_Marie shuddered. She had no idea how the hell she was supposed to do that._

_Her granny squeezed her hand. “I’m not goin’ anywhere,” she said. “Not ’til this is over. Neither’s anybody else’s people. You do what you need to do to protect him, ’cause he’s the one it -- they -- will go after first. He’ll think he can take it on his own, but you know better. Don’t let him think he can get away with that.”_

_That made her smile, just a little. “I won’t. He knows me better than to think I’d let him do anythin’ I thought was too stupid.”_

_“He’s a man, child,” he granny deadpanned. “Half of what they_ do _is stupid. The trick is gettin’ ’em to do the other half.”_

_“I’ll work on that.” She would, too. She didn’t think she had a choice._

\--

One advantage of the kitten system was that the ‘watchers’ could take turns napping. Kitty had had far more rest than Ororo and Raven, so she volunteered to let them get a cat-nap in, and wake up any of the Nightmare Trio if she had to. They left two lamps on, just in case, on the theory that waking up to light would be better than coming to in total darkness.

It really did sort of seem to work. She had to poke Hank awake twice, but she must have managed it before the dreams really sank their claws in, because he didn’t exactly seem traumatized. He woke, twitched, rolled over, and went back to sleep. It was the same with Magneto: both times, she poked him as soon as he started to twitch, waking him before whatever was in his dreams took hold. He grumbled both times, but she suspected that was automatic habit.

She failed Clarice, however. The other two had started thrashing, but Clarice curled into a little ball, folding in on herself. Kitty had no idea what she was dreaming of until she let out a soft, terrified, broken little cry, a shudder passing through her from head to toe.

 _Motherfucker_. Kitty scrambled over to her, giving her shoulder a gentle shake. “Come on, Clarice,” she said quietly. “Wake up. It’s not real -- you’re just dreaming. You’re not alone.”

Clarice didn’t wake, so Kitty, slightly desperate, nudged Ororo’s calf with her toes. “Ororo, help me out,” she whispered. “I can’t wake her up.”

Ororo, though groggy, immediately sat up and brushed the hair back from Clarice’s face. “Clarice,” she said. “ _Clarice_. It’s only a nightmare, Clarice. Here, see.” She took Clarice’s left hand and set it on top of one of the sleeping kittens.

“It’s kitten therapy, Clarice,” Kitty said. “Remember?”

Fortunately, that actually worked. Clarice opened her eyes, her fingers curling through the kitten’s fur. She was far too pale, and she was shivering, but she was awake. The darkness didn’t have her anymore. “See?” Kitty said. “Still light. And you have a fuzzy thing.”

Clarice gave her a small, tremulous smile. “I do. I...I think I need to stay awake for a while.”

“You want me to get you anything?” Kitty asked. “I can go grab something, so Ororo can stay with you.”

“Just some water,” Clarice whispered, stroking the kitten.

“You two stay put,” Kitty ordered, climbing to her feet with a wince. Sitting for so long had made her leg stiffen up again. Grabbing one of the coffee mugs, she took it into the bathroom and washed it in the sink, trying to get out every trace of coffee before filling it with cold water. _Mental note_ , she thought. _Bring more dishes tomorrow._

Clarice gulped the water so fast that Kitty thought she’d choke, but a trace of color came back into her face. Another kitten had found her, this one decided her sleeve was a wonderful thing to chew on, and it purred up a storm while it was at it.

“I’m going to be awake for a while,” Ororo said. “Go get some sleep, Kitty.”

“Are you sure?” Kitty asked dubiously. “I’ve had a lot more rest than you have, recently.”

“I’m sure. I’ll wake you again if I need to.”

Frankly, Kitty was grateful. Everything hurt again, and a nap would do her good. She limped back to her own mattress, shifted several kittens, and fell asleep in moments.

She was shortly to wish she hadn’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Marie and Erik are not the only people being visited by the Afterlife’s Little Helpers. Unfortunately, not all the Helpers are welcome.
> 
> “Go the Fuck to Sleep” is by Adam Mansbach. While the Samuel L. Jackson reading is fucking hilarious, just read it in Ellen Page’s voice. I dare you.


	21. Visitations and Perception

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Marie is possessive (and Logan does not mind), cookery is fucked up, the Professor is rather impressed, and Erik sucks at sympathy (but at least he tries).

For once, Marie woke before Logan. It was so damn early that she didn’t want to rouse him as well, so she tiptoed out into the hallway to use some other room’s bathroom.

She wasn’t quite sure just how long she’d been asleep, but she felt surprisingly refreshed. That weird-ass dream about her granny lingered, but it had been a comforting thing -- certainly more comforting than anything she’d dreamed in probably the last decade. Despite her granny’s dire warnings, she felt oddly optimistic.

Was it just a dream? Before all this shit happened, Marie could have easily written it off. As it was, it had been so incredibly vivid, which wasn’t like her normal dreams at all. She though she could still smell a ghost of the honeysuckle. There sure as hell wasn’t any of that at the mansion.

Despite the hour, the aroma of cinnamon rolls was wafting out of the kitchen. She hoped it wasn’t Clarice, that the poor woman hadn’t spent another sleepless night and decided to get up and bake instead. Judging by the slamming sounds, it was distinctly possible.

It wasn’t Clarice, however -- it was Kitty. Moreover, it was a red-eyed, extremely upset Kitty, limping around the kitchen like a tiny, uneven whirlwind.

“Kitty?” Marie asked. “I’m not gonna ask if you’re okay, ’cause you’re obviously not. What happened?”

“Tara,” Kitty said, choking a little on the word. At Marie’s confused look, she sighed. “That’s right, you wouldn’t know about Tara. It’s just...something that happened in the future. I dreamed about it last night, and I don’t want to talk about it.”

Marie couldn’t blame her. She wouldn’t want to talk about her nightmares, either. “You want some help? ’Cause at this rate you’re gonna destroy the kitchen.”

Kitty paused, looking around. She’d spilled a trail of flour across the floor and walked all through it, leaving white, uneven footprints everywhere. Bits of dough were stuck to the cutting-board, and the counters were streaked with sugar and cinnamon. “I guess,” she said, her voice uneven.

“I’ll get all this crap cleaned up,” Marie said firmly. “You just cook, okay?”

She could tell Kitty was trying to smile, but couldn’t quite manage it. “Gotcha.”

They worked in silence until the sun rose, and Logan’s heavy tread heralded his arrival. “I smell somethin’ good --” he said, but paused when he saw Kitty’s face. “Tara?” he asked quietly.

Kitty nodded miserably, and Marie wondered even more what the hell that meant. “I don’t want to talk about it. I think I need a walk.” 

“Okay,” he said, but he was obviously concerned. “But Kitty? You should talk to the Professor later. He can help.”

“I’ll think about it,” she said, which Marie took to mean there was no way in hell. She limped off through the French doors, out into the sunrise.

“What’s Tara?” Marie asked, once she’d gone.

Logan sighed. “Somethin’ you don’t ever bring up,” he said. “We lost a lotta people to the Sentinels, but we lost Tara to one of _us._ Kid was about fourteen, orphan, and Kitty’d taken her on like some kinda little sister. Long story short, guy did bad, bad things to her, and Kitty killed him. The nasty way.”

“What did she do?” Marie asked, appalled.

“She can tell you herself, if she feels like it. It was...ugly. She had nightmares about it for a good year afterward, but I thought they were done.”

Marie was quiet. She had a suspicion. “Logan,” she said, “did you dream last night? I know you sorta had a nightmare, but did you dream anythin’ else?”

“First off, it really was only _sorta_ a nightmare,” he said, grabbing the frosting spoon and licking it like a disobedient kid. “Whatever you did, I think it worked, but I wanna see the Professor about it. I think we both need to. Second off...yeah, I did. And it was...weird. Not like anythin’ I normally dream.”

“Was it someone tellin’ you we had to go back to France?” she asked, snatching the spoon away from him. “Someone you know’s dead?”

“...Yeah it was,” he said slowly. “Somebody tell you to?”

She nodded. “My granny, except she was young. Maybe Kitty wasn’t just dreamin’ about Tara.” That was a horrible thought. If Kitty’s dream had been anything like as vivid as Marie’s, no wonder she was so upset. “I think we need to ask the others. As much as I don’t wanna go back to France...” She was sure he’d know what she meant. They might not want to, but that didn’t mean they didn’t have to, if they wanted this to end. She couldn’t do for the others what she’d done for Logan -- she knew that. Oh, she might be able to help them a little, have the Professor teach them her method of locking away all the things in her head that shouldn’t be there, but it wouldn’t be enough. It wasn’t enough even with Logan, who she had such a strong connection with.

“One more reason to talk to the Professor,” he sighed. “Look, once everyone else wakes up -- don’t say anythin’ about Kitty. She’ll go to Clarice or Ororo when she’s ready. Anybody asks, she just went for a walk to get away from the circus.”

“Can do. Somebody’s gotta talk her into goin’ to the Professor, though,” she said. “Dunno what I’d have done, if I’d just been stuck with everythin’ from the camps.”

Logan sighed again. “We can try,” he said, “but that’s all we can do. It might or might not work.”

Marie would force it, sooner or later, if she absolutely had to. “Either way, we oughtta finish these,” she said, gesturing at the batch of cinnamon rolls that still needed to go in the oven. “You have any experience with these things? ’Cause I haven’t made ’em since I was a kid.”

“No,” he said, “but how hard can it be?”

She groaned. “Why the hell did you have to go and say that?”

\--

Clarice was tired, but she was no longer completely exhausted. Though it had been periodically interrupted, she’d got more sleep last night than she had in the previous three days combined. After that first time, one of the watchers had always woken her before the nightmare could truly get its claws in her. During the brief periods between, when she’d been too scared to drop off again, Kitty had recited the rest of “Go the Fuck to Sleep.” It was damn near impossible to stay terrified after hearing that.

When she finally got up, Ororo was sound asleep, and Raven was dozing. Kitty was nowhere to be found, but she’d probably gone off in search of breakfast.

Clarice hoped she’d found it before Rogue and Logan got to the kitchen. She heard the smoke alarm long before she’d reached it, and the smell of burnt cinnamon rolls wafted down the hallway. How, oh how had they managed to screw that up?

The smoke was an outright haze in the kitchen itself, so thick she started coughing. “What did you do?” she demanded, opening the window over the sink. 

“Honestly, I’m not sure,” Rogue said. “We checked on ’em every five minutes. Logan yanked ’em out and none of ’em look burnt.”

Actually, they really didn’t. Each tray looked damn near perfect, so seriously, what the hell had they done?

Clarice opened the oven door, which sent more smoke pouring out. Helpfully, she turned off the oven, which at least one of them should have thought of. She grabbed an oven mitt, trying to dispel the smoke -- and when she finally succeeded, she groaned.

“Give me that spatula, will you?” she said. “The metal one.”

Logan, mystified, did so. She leaned down enough to chisel the lump of charcoal from the bottom. “One of you knocked a roll off the tray,” she grunted. Damn thing was really stuck on there. “Now it’s a briquette. You’re lucky it didn’t catch on fire.” She shot them both an extremely disappointed glare, which actually made even Logan look just a little sheepish. He might not know how to cook cinnamon rolls, but he did know how to _count_ , for fuck’s sake. 

He traded a glance with Rogue, and they both burst out laughing. Once upon a time, Clarice had been used to Rogue’s laugh, but Logan? That was just weird. It wasn’t that he didn’t have a sense of humor -- he did, sometimes a very wicked one -- but if he actually did any laughing, he did it in private. Trust Rogue to be able to pull some out of him in front of another person.

“We’ll have you supervise next time,” Rogue said, wiping her eyes. Her glove had a trace of frosting on it, which smeared across her face. “Well, dammit.”

Clarice bit the inside of her cheek. “What even gave you the idea to make something like cinnamon rolls without...supervision?”

“Kitty started it,” Rogue said. “She got fed up when we came down and decided to go for a walk.”

That...didn’t sound like Kitty. Oh, under most circumstances she’d abandon something that wasn’t vitally important, but ditching out on her cooking just because of Rogue and Logan? Doubtful. “It was Tara, wasn’t it?”

Logan fell silent, his laughter cut off in an instant. “Yeah,” he said. “Speakin’ of that, did you have any dreams last night that weren’t the nightmare? Did you dream about anybody dead?”

She blinked. “How the _hell_ did you know that? Yeah, I did. My older sister.”

“She tell you to go back to France? ’Cause if so, I’m gettin’ really creeped out.”

Clarice winced. “Sorry, but I have to creep you out. That’s almost exactly what she said. That we all have to go, not just us that went down into the basement.”

“Well, dammit,” Rogue muttered. “Anybody else think they need some bourbon with breakfast?”

“Wouldn’t say no to some beer,” Logan said. “Doubt we’re gonna be the only ones who wanna start out the day with a little booze.”

\--

Ororo began her day troubled -- and from Hank’s and Raven’s expressions, she was not the only one.

She rarely remembered her dreams anymore, which was well enough -- those she did recall were almost never pleasant. But last night she’d dreamed of her grandmother, sitting under the hot sun of her childhood, telling her things she did not want to hear. By now, however, she knew that what she wanted often didn’t matter. 

She didn’t want to ask Raven or Hank just what had visited them in their sleep. Instinct told her she was not the only one who had had such a dream -- why she should think so, she didn’t know, but no matter how unfounded her certainty might be, it was unshakable. She’d speak to the others of her own group, and see what they had to say. 

To her genuine surprise, Kitty’s scheme actually did seem to work, to a point -- with the added benefit that the watchers could rest, too. Ororo, who hadn’t properly slept in two days, had definitely needed it. While she woke with a crick in her neck and a kitten on her face, she felt genuinely _rested_.

Magneto was still quite unconscious, and Raven and Hank were deep in conversation. It was probably best to leave them to it -- and anyway, she was hungry.

It smelled like cinnamon rolls, and fortunately it looked like Clarice had had a hand in them. If they’d been entirely prepared by Logan and Rogue...well, Rogue _was_ a half-decent cook, but Ororo wouldn’t want anything Logan might come up with anywhere near her digestive tract. Rogue was giggling over something he’d said, and he looked at her with a sort of fond exasperation. 

Ororo collected a cinnamon roll, eyeing it a little warily as she joined Clarice at the table. Half of Anathea’s gang were already there, investigating their own rolls with a solemn concentration that was somehow endearing and really damn funny.

“Don’t worry, they’re edible,” Clarice said. “Kitty started them, and I showed those two how to finish. They actually weren’t doing bad when I found them.” 

Ororo arched an eyebrow, carefully cutting off a piece with her fork. To her surprise, it actually was good, light and sticky in the way a cinnamon roll actually should be. “I’m impressed,” she said, and meant it. “Raven and Hank should be down soon, but I wanted to ask what you dreamed about first.”

Clarice’s eyebrows went up. “You too, huh? I know Rogue and Logan did, and I’m betting it’s why Kitty bailed on us. I was hoping we could ignore it, but I should have known better.”

She looked down the table at Anathea’s group, who had evidently decided the cinnamon rolls were fit to eat. “Hey Anathea, did any of you dream last night? About anything special, I mean.”

The girl was quiet a moment. “My mother,” she said. “She say she is my mother, I mean. I never knew her.”

Unfortunately, that only added credence to Ororo’s hypothesis. While she had not enjoyed what her grandmother said, at least seeing her had been a comfort. Given Rogue and Logan’s moods, theirs had at least not been a hardship, nor had Clarice’s. Kitty, however...well, Ororo’s first thought was Tara. Nothing else could have upset the poor woman enough to drive her away.

Raven and Hank did not appear, but Magneto did, and the sight of him gave her pause. She’d never seen such an expression on his face, now or in the future. He was...subdued, but not in any way she would have expected. There was grief in his eyes, but also a strange, sad sort of...peace? Just who had _he_ dreamed of last night?

Apparently, she wasn’t the only one to notice, either. Logan actually did a double take, but of course he’d sense it -- no doubt he could smell whatever it was. Rogue blinked, and shot him a confused look, silently questioning. His returning glance seemed to be all the answer she needed, and Ororo wondered just how they could communicate with nothing more than their eyes. 

Whatever it was Logan thought, he actually kept it to himself while Magneto poured coffee. He ignored the cinnamon rolls, and headed for the sofa rather than the table. For once, however, he wasn’t just lurking.

“We have to go back,” he said, his voice quite hoarse. “And soon.”

“Who did you see?” Ororo asked, as gently as she could.

He didn’t actually seem surprised by the question. “My mother,” he said quietly.

Even Logan winced. Neither the Professor nor Magneto himself had ever talked about either of his parents, but considering he’d been a child in a concentration camp, it was pretty easy to guess what had happened to them. Ouch.

“She’s right,” Logan said, after a long, rather awkward silence. “Somebody probably told the Professor, too. I’m sure as hell not gonna go down there again without a plan, though.”

“My granny said that they -- I’m guessin’ she meant all the people we’ve got in our sleep -- aren’t goin’ anywhere. Much as I’d like to keep her a while, Kitty got a bad one. Whatever’s sendin’ ’em to us fucked up with her.”

_Tara_ , Ororo thought, and inwardly cringed. “Should I go talk to her?”

“No,” Logan said. “All of us but Marie were there. Leave her be for a bit. She’ll be better off on her own for now.”

Ororo strenuously disagreed, but she’d hold off for a while anyway -- a very _short_ while.

\--

It didn’t take long for Erik to lose his stomach for the atmosphere in the kitchen. It was far too tense, and it was dulling the memory of that odd, bittersweet dream.

The sun wasn’t yet high enough for the heat to soar, so he wandered the uncut grass, coffee in hand. How very _different_ this place was. Like its owner, it had been let go for years, and had almost turned fallow. The smell of grass was still quite a novelty to him -- it was odd to think he’d been out of prison for less than a week. Somehow, it seemed much longer.

How had his mother come to him? Where was she now? It had been a very, very long time since he’d had faith of any kind, in the living or the divine. Seeing her now, so vividly, had shaken him. He wondered if it had seemed so real for the others. 

A long-dried acorn landed in his coffee, sending the hot liquid splashing over his hand. He looked up, irritated, and saw a small figure sitting high up in the branches. It had to be Kitty, but it didn’t seem she’d done it on purpose. She was facing half away, shredding leaves and letting them fall.

What was it Ororo had said -- that her ‘visitor’ was a bad one? Erik pondered leaving her to it -- God knew _he_ wouldn’t want anyone interrupting him, were he in her position. “Who did you see last night?” he asked, dumping his tainted coffee onto the lawn.

She peered down at him. Her eyes were swollen and red, her expression beyond miserable -- and that was just so, so _wrong_. She was devious, sometimes irritable, often slightly evil, and occasionally sympathetic. Misery did not fit.

She was quiet for so long that he began to think she wouldn’t answer. When she finally spoke, she said, “Do you ever have nightmares about people you couldn’t save?” Her voice was thick and hoarse and wrong wrong _wrong_. “Or people you’ve killed?”

Ah. Now he understood. He debated lying, but that would serve no point right now. “Yes,” he admitted, “though I’d rather you not tell anyone. Get out of that tree, will you? I don’t want anything else hitting me in the face.”

She blinked, obviously startled, but started a slow climb down, careful of both ribs and leg. When she finally reached the ground, she wiped her hands on her shirt. “In the future, you’re always saying how we’re better than humanity, that we’re somehow superior in everything. You’re wrong, you know,” she said, her eyes trained on the un-trimmed fruit trees. “Really, _really_ wrong.”

“How so?” he asked, watching her carefully. She didn’t look ready to hit him, but he’d rather see it coming if she did.

Now she looked at him, and swallowed hard. “We do bad shit, too,” she said quietly. “To each other. We aren’t any better than humans. We can just do stuff they can’t.” She sat beneath the tree, though whether it was because she wanted to, or because she couldn’t bother standing anymore, he didn’t know. He sat beside her, because what else could he do? Interrupting her would do no good, so he waited for her to continue, silent.

“When the Sentinels happened, sure, a lot of humans went nuts on us at first,” she went on, eventually. “And a lot of us returned it, you know? The the Sentinels got worse, and humans tried to hide us from them, and tried to help us make some kind of resistance. 

“We got sent up to the Rockies for a while, a lot of us from the school, and met up with this other group that hadn’t had it nearly so good. They were starving and pissed off at the world, and we sort of just left them alone, but there was this girl, Tara. She was fourteen, I think, orphan kid even littler than me. I sort of took her on, brought her into our group, and she did well. Really, really well. Except one of her people resented the hell out of it, right, and he got her out in the woods and...did stuff...to her. I caught him and I killed him, but we didn’t have the resources to save her.”

Kitty paused, wiping her eyes on her sleeve. “She died,” she said. “Right in front of me. And last night, she came back.”

Had there been a human involved, Erik would not have been appalled by her story. Angry, yes, but hardly surprised. As it was...well, now what was he supposed to do? What could he say to that? She needed one of the others -- hell, she needed anyone but him, but he was the one who was here. He certainly wasn’t going to tell her what Marie had said, about their visitors sticking around.

“Look,” he said, trying not to sound overly awkward, “I’m not any good at this. I don’t know what to say or do. I realize how tactless this question is, but did he at least get what he deserved?”

A very faint ghost of a smile crossed her lips. It was bitter, and vicious in a way he’d never yet seen from her, even at her angriest. “You could say that,” she said. “I reached into his chest and ripped his heart out.”

Erik stared at her. However much she seemed to enjoy throwing things, he had a very difficult time imagining her executing anyone in such a fashion. No one in her group seemed to mention their future in anything more than passing. Now he _really_ had no idea what to say. The only thing he was quite certain would be wrong was, ‘I’m sorry.’ Eventually, all he could come up with was, “You need a drink. Stay here.”

That actually earned an extremely brief, somewhat incredulous smile. “You know, you’re not nearly as much of an asshole as I thought at first.”

“I’ll choose to take that as a compliment,” he said, somewhat relieved she could snark at him. “I mean it. Stay here.”

Nobody intercepted him when he made his way to the liquor cabinet, no doubt because not even Logan would consider getting into the hard stuff so very early in the day. Of course it hadn’t occurred to him to ask what she wanted, but at the moment, he doubted she cared. He grabbed a bottle of whiskey that was probably older than he was, and discovered a bottle of Jagermeister behind it. She’d have a choice.

Hank eyed him on his way out. “Little early, isn’t it?”

Erik glared at him. “Not a word, do you hear me? To anyone.”

Hank blinked. “Um, sure. Okay. Uh, have fun with that.”

Kitty was, fortunately, exactly where he’d left her, staring at her hands as she shredded a patch of clover. When she looked up, she blinked at the bottles in his hands -- clearly, she’d thought he wouldn’t actually make good on his word.

“Pick one,” he said, setting them down. “Or both, although I doubt they would go well together.”

That actually made her snort. She picked up the bottle of Jager, unscrewed the cap with a little difficulty, and downed three long swallows. “Jesus _Christ!_ And here Logan said Jager was actually good.” It didn’t stop her from taking another gulp, though it made her eyes water.

“It’s an acquired taste,” he said dryly, sitting and grabbing the bottle of whiskey. Yes, it was far too early for alcohol, but he wasn’t going to let her drink alone -- mostly because being sober around an intoxicated person was far too awkward. At least he, weighing more than ninety pounds, could have a little without getting blackout drunk.

“I don’t want to go back there,” she said, after another long swallow. “I mean, I wasn’t even down in the basement and I don’t want to go back. Did you get told we all need to go down?”

“I did,” he said slowly. “I wish I knew why.”

She looked at him, curious. “Who did you dream about?”

He looked away. Somehow, he felt like talking about it would...cheapen it, in some way, but he answered nevertheless. “My mother. It’s been...a very long time since I’ve dreamed of her.” Most of those dreams had been of her death, but he was hardly going to say _that_. 

“That had to be nice,” Kitty said, rather wistfully. “I mean, I hope.” She took another long draw at the bottle, and he sighed inwardly. At that rate, it would be about five more minutes before she wouldn’t be able to walk at all, let alone in a straight line. But she wasn’t crying anymore, and that could only be counted as a victory. Drunks he could handle, but tears? No. Not remotely.

“Slow down on that,” he said. “You’ll get sick. And if you vomit on me, I’ll leave you to Hank’s mercies.”

“Oh, God no,” she groaned. “I don’t need that scolding. I don’t know if he’s like this yet, but in the future, if you screwed up enough to land in the infirmary, he never, ever let you forget it. _Ever_.”

He noted she used the past tense, but wasn’t going to ask. Not yet. “Then pace yourself.” Charles would never let him hear the end of it, if he gave Kitty alcohol poisoning -- although Logan might murder him before Charles had the chance to say a word. _That_ was a fate best avoided.

\--

Logan, Marie noticed, was the only one who hadn’t said just who had visited him in his sleep. She knew he wouldn’t have omitted that without reason, so she didn’t press, but she was curious. She couldn’t help but be.

He’d said very, very little about his life before he met her. Oh, she knew he’d been experimented on -- what Stryker had done to him. But the rest of it? At first he hadn’t remembered, but now she wondered if he didn’t _want_ to.

He didn’t seem troubled, though, and she took comfort in that. Even Ororo had looked somewhat disturbed, and her visitation had been a positive one. If he wasn’t concerned, she wouldn’t be.

They were on their way to visit the Professor, bearing a plate of cinnamon rolls. Marie hoped like hell he could tell her just why what she’d done had even partially worked -- and what she could do to finish the job, short of actually returning to France. While that might be necessary to end this, it wasn’t something she wanted to think about just then.

As ever, he was in his office, but he was quite obviously not happy. Face too pale, his eyes two haunted blue wells lost in dark shadows. His visitor, she was sure, had not been a welcome one.

He stirred when he saw them, setting aside the book on his desk. “Logan, Marie. I was hoping you would come by.”

Logan eyed him. “I think you were hopin’ we’d bring you a drink. Look like you could use one.”

“We have cinnamon rolls,” Marie said, shooting him a mild glare. Much as she loved Logan, sometimes his lack of tact was aggravating.

The Professor smiled a little, but there wasn’t much heart in it. “I could use them,” he said. “Marie, what you did worked, didn’t it?”

“Mostly,” Logan said. “There was still a little, but it felt like...well, like everythin’ was runnin’ into a wall before it could get in. Like Marie had put another one of the walls in her head around me, too.”

He sounded proud, but if she’d done it, she had no idea how. It probably had more to do with how deeply ingrained the Professor’s training was: she might not know how to do it on purpose, but evidently her subconscious did. 

“Good.” The Professor sounded immensely relieved. He must not have checked anyone’s head in any depth yet. “I want to attempt to teach the others. We need to return to France, but we’re not going anywhere near that house until I have more information. I’m not taking anyone into that basement without a plan.”

Well, that answered one question, though she hadn’t doubted that he would have had a visitor, too. “Who’d you see?” she asked, holding out the plate.

He winced, almost imperceptibly. “My father,” he said, taking a roll and examining it almost absently. “I had some choice words for him, but when I’d finally finished, he told me we needed to go to the basement. He said that everything I’d need to know is in my grandfather’s journal.” He gestured to the open book in front of him, before peeling of a piece of his cinnamon roll almost fastidiously.

Logan sighed. “Of course he wouldn’t just tell you,” he muttered. “After all, that’d actually be _easy_.”

“I think we all got talked to by somebody,” Marie said. “Even Anathea and her group, and we hadn’t even grabbed them yet. Whatever’s down there, it wants _all_ of us.”

“Which doesn’t make sense,” the Professor sighed. “Oh, that it wants us mutants, yes. But Anathea and her companions are human.”

“Maybe it doesn’t have anythin’ to do with us bein’ mutants,” Marie said slowly. “Outta the four of us that went down into basement, half were from the future, and so are Anathea and her people. It could be it wasn’t just openin’ the basement that...woke things up. Might be that there were some time travelers there, too. Can’t prove it or anythin’, but it’s a thought.”

The Professor’s expression was one she recognized quite well -- she was just used to seeing it on an older face. He was deeply intrigued, his eyes almost on fire with curiosity. All at once, his earlier weariness seemed to vanish. “You may well be right,” he said thoughtfully. “To my knowledge, your two groups are the only people who have ever traveled in time. Before the school closed, I sought mutants all over the globe -- and while I found people with almost every power imaginable, none could truly affect time, let alone travel through it.”

“None of us were supposed to,” Logan said. “Kitty sent my mind back into my younger body. Only reason she could send me back so far is because of my healin’ factor, or my mind woulda snapped. What worries me is that, while Marie and all of them are actually here physically, I dunno where the hell my body is.”

“Because of your claws?” the Professor said. 

“Because of the claws. If my body’s still in the future, there’s nothin’ that should be keepin’ my mind here without Kitty to hold it. And everybody else -- older you and Magneto, everybody who was with us then -- where the hell are they? Are they wanderin’ around out there somewhere, not bein’ able to get here? I’m not even sure the question’s how we got back here, but what sent us, and why.”

“Not somethin’ I’ve cared much to think about,” Marie said, “and I doubt anyone else has, either. ’Course, it’s not like we’ve had a whole lotta spare time when somethin’ wasn’t goin’ wrong.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” Logan muttered.

“I think,” the Professor said with a sigh, “that before we even consider going back, we _have_ to figure out what sent you here. Doing otherwise might end in disaster.”

“And a bunch of us dyin’,” Marie said. “My granny told me that not everybody might make it out alive, so we had to make damn sure we all would.” Even without the adamantium, Logan was damn near impossible to kill, but he was the only one. The rest of them, no matter how powerful they might be, were physically just as frail as any human. She could borrow his healing if necessary, but nobody else could. 

Ororo, powerful as she was, wasn’t immune to a shiv through the kidney, and if Clarice couldn’t jump through a portal fast enough, she’d be done for. Kitty’s intangibility made her tougher to deal with, but she couldn’t fight unless she was completely solid, and then she was as vulnerable as the rest of them. And Marie, for some reason, was pretty damn certain they were the ones the thing in the basement would go after first, because they were the time travelers. What could it gain from them?

Logan took her hand, and gave it a slight squeeze. She looked at him, and smiled a little. Each had the other to look after them, and they didn’t need the Professor’s telepathy to do it. The rest, no matter how bound they were by years of shared suffering, just didn’t have that connection.

“We need to speak with the others about this,” the Professor said. “Later, when everyone is fully awake. First I need to speak to Anathea, and find out just how her group came here. They at least did so on purpose.”

“You want either of us should stay?” Marie asked.

The Professor shook his head. “No, but if you could send Clarice, I would appreciate it. Anathea seems to have bonded with her, and her presence might help. Meanwhile, I’d like to take a look at your mind, Marie, to see just what it did last night.”

She nodded, and sat in one of the armchairs. Logan laid a warm hand on her shoulder. While she tried to make her mind as easy to read as possible, the others were restless, wanting out into the mental prison yard. She’d let a few out later, when she didn’t have to concentrate on anything.

“Marie, your mind really is quite remarkable,” the Professor said. “I’d like to let it rest another day, so I can look in one more time before I try to teach your methods to the others. It might be vital, before we return to the basement.”

“Can’t ever be too prepared,” she said, smiling when Logan squeezed her shoulder. “Lemme know if you need anythin’ more from me, okay?”

“Thank you, Marie. I’ll let Clarice wait until she’s ready to come to me, but please tell her I would like to see her.”

“I will. Thanks, Professor.” 

When she and Logan had reached the hallway, he wrapped an arm around her shoulders, pulling her close. “Whenever we do go back to that goddamn basement, you stay close, you hear me? And I mean close. In that dark down there, everybody else coulda been on the moon for all I was aware of ’em. I heard ’em just fine, but could I have found ’em without pure luck? No. Only found Trask ’cause I damn near stepped on him. I don’t wanna lose you in the dark.”

“As if you could ever get rid of me,” she said, giving him a reassuring smile. “I might as well tell you the same thing. I didn’t get you back just to lose you to some nasty-ass piece of...whatever.”

“Possessive, aren’t you?” he said, raising an eyebrow at her. 

“And don’t you forget it. Nothin’s draggin’ you off if I have anythin’ to say about it.” She meant it, too. She didn’t care what lived in that basement -- God help it if it tried to grab Logan. She’d fight it for everyone, but Logan was...well, Logan. That was all the explanation needed.

He shook his head, knowing better than to protest. “On a total other note, as much as I don’t wanna ask, Ororo’d tell me off if I did,” he said. “Kitty’s got some fool idea in her head that if the four of us stay in one room, with all our ‘watchers’ -- in my case, that’s you -- it might help with the nightmares. Dunno if it worked for any of ’em last night, but it’s your choice.”

It was a somewhat bizarre idea, but Marie could actually see the logic behind it. “We could try it,” she said. “I mean, if you don’t think you’d kill everyone within an hour. You’ve got it a little better now, but it might help Clarice, havin’ someone she really knows.”

He sighed, so gloomy she laughed. “It’ll be fine, sugar. Might even be entertainin’.”

“That,” he said, a little wearily, “is what I’m afraid of.”

\--

The kitchen was, as ever, a disaster. Clarice set about cleaning it just to give her hands something to do, while her mind wandered.

She’d always been a tidy person, before. Her dorm was never a mess like some of the other girls’; hers rarely had a thing out of place, and never for long. Since the world went to shit, she hadn’t had enough things to make a mess.

But now she had things again -- assorted tasks to be taken care of. She didn’t think it was that the others _didn’t_ care -- there were just other thoughts that took precedence. Not that she minded, since it gave her something that was hers and hers alone.

Logan breezed in, though at least he didn’t leave a mess in his wake. “Goin’ to town soon, so make a list. Might need two trips, even with that bus the Professor’s got. We go through a goddamn lotta food.”

“Well, there’s seventeen of us,” she pointed out. “Who’s going?”

“Me and Rogue, and Kitty if we can find her. Don’t wanna let her wander off on her own too long, or she might do somethin’ stupid.”

That was a semi-flimsy excuse; Kitty was not the type to hurt herself or anyone else, unless she absolutely had to. Chucking croutons didn’t count. “Pretty sure she’s not alone,” she said, and left it at that.

“...Right,” he said, obviously catching on. “Well, I guess it can’t hurt much. Anyway, Professor wants to see you and Anathea, when you’ve got a minute.”

Clarice wasn’t sure if she should be alarmed or not. He likely wanted to see her about the nightmares, but Anathea was another story. Why would he want them both at the same time? “Okay,” she said. “I’ll make the list first.”

\--

Logan was damn glad he had Marie with him. He didn’t recognize half the shit on Clarice’s list, and wouldn’t have known where to find it even if he did. Just what the fuck was hummus, anyway?

Marie laughed when he asked. The car was sweltering, and he was already sweaty and irritable, but that laugh soothed him. “It’s a kind of seasonin’,” she said. “Clarice make this?”

“Most of it. Got a little from damn near everyone. Anathea translated for her people, but they’re pretty easy to please. If it doesn’t move, they’ll probably eat it.”

“Still not used to havin’ good food myself,” she said. “I mean, I know it hasn’t even been a week, but still.”

Logan snorted, laying on the horn when some asshole came shooting out of a side street. “Feels a hell of a lot longer, doesn’t it?” He shook his head. “The mansion seems full enough as it is, so I dunno what it’s gonna feel like when the school’s open again. And you know the Professor will, once we take care of the basement shit.” While it had been full of students in his past, somehow, after seeing it so empty, he didn’t know how they’d handle it when it returned to full capacity.

“I know.” She paused, peeling her right glove off and sticking her hand out the window to feel the breeze. “I wanna be a teacher. I mean, once I know enough about somethin’ to teach it.”

Marie would make a good teacher, he thought. She had more patience than most of the people he’d ever known, and she was smart. He was the one who would have a hard time finding something actually useful to do -- unless he could somehow con the Professor into letting him teach P.E.. Then again, half the poor bastards might not survive. While it would be entertaining as hell, it wouldn’t exactly be productive.

“Pick anythin’ and you’ll be good at it,” he said. “Well, except maybe cookin’.”

She gave him a light smack on the arm. “Hush, you. I”ll learn, and so will you. Can’t depend on poor Clarice and Kitty forever. I know Hank means well, but...well, you saw the results. Lucky we didn’t all get food poisonin’.”

It would take a lot more than mangled pizza to give him food poisoning, but she had a point. They were all going to have to learn a lot of things, if the school was ever to open again. There were people that needed to be found -- Jean and Scott, and probably young Ororo (and wouldn’t _that_ be weird). And Christ, it wasn’t just young Marie that would turn up, but Clarice and Kitty as well, in time. Then what?

He also wasn’t convinced that the others from the future weren’t back here somewhere, too. Having both Professors wouldn’t be bad at all, but he didn’t get along with future Magneto any better that with this past one. They’d worked well together, but that didn’t mean they _liked_ each other, or ever would. If they both decided to stick around, he was going to do his damnedest to talk Marie into moving to a deserted island.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rogue, you are too perceptive for that thing in the basement to be comfortable with, though no one is going to be comfortable once they get some answers out of Anathea. And Erik...well, you tried. You get a ribbon for participation, even if you’re a long, long way from winning a medal.


	22. Unwelcome Discoveries, Feeding Frenzies, and Comfort in a Bottle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Charles discovers how Anathea and her people arrived in the past, Marie ponders the...physical aspects...of a relationship and realizes she needs advice, and Erik actually manages to be useful, even if it _is_ mostly by mistake.

Charles was expecting Clarice and Anathea. He was not expecting to hear Kitty pass beneath his window, so drunk she could barely walk, attempting to sing. And he _certainly_ could not have anticipated Erik allowing her to use him as a living crutch.

Kitty’s distress hit him like a brick. While he’d made a point of not reading his companion’s minds, Kitty was one of the few he didn’t worry about, what he felt form her now troubled him.

_Tara_. The name held nothing but pain for her, and he didn’t want to pry further. She was hurt and she was very, very drunk, but Erik, in his own stilted, awkward, borderline-unnatural way, was a comfort to her. Charles wouldn’t worry about her unless it didn’t help enough.

A somewhat timid knock sounded at his door. It was Anathea, though Clarice was not yet with her. He needed to know why she was so very skittish, and he didn’t want to read her mind from afar. It seemed...unfair, somehow.

“Come in,” he said, and when she opened the door, her black eyes scanned the room for exits with a speed and a thoroughness he knew to be automatic. Strange. She never looked so hunted when she was among the others. It was not fear of him, precisely, but she was not at ease with him -- and she didn’t even know what his gift was.

Ah. He was leader, like Alfred, and they all feared Alfred -- or at least, they had done. All the time spent in this madhouse had made him seem rather less threatening.

“You want to see me?” she said, creeping forward.

“You and Clarice, but I’d like to speak with you before she gets here,” he said, putting a subtle compulsion of tranquility into his tone. “I need to know how your people came back in time.”

To his surprise, she froze, her sudden tension almost like a slap to the face. She’d been hoping he wouldn’t ask, and was terrified to say anything of it. “If I tell you, you will not want us here,” she said quietly, and more than a little desperately. “We did not know what Alfred was doing before he does it, but none of us stop him. It was complicate, and I do not know the details. All I know is what he finish -- finished? -- with.”

She sounded beyond miserable. Her certainty that he would evict them was absolute, which was...troubling. Charles couldn’t imagine her or most of her group doing anything terrible, but he didn’t need telepathy to feel Alfred’s ruthlessness.

“Let me see your mind,” he said. “I promise, I will not simply throw you out into the world, but I need to know how you arrived in the past, for several reasons.”

She nodded, and she wasn’t surprised by the request, by what it implied about his mutation. She had guessed, then. “Does it hurt?”

“No, Anathea,” he said, as soothingly as he could. “You won’t feel a thing.”

_Cold. Her world, her future, was very, very cold, the sky an eternal sea of clouds. Nuclear winter, he realized, though she had no knowledge of the term, nor of how it had come to be. Most of her people lived in conditions beyond primitive, but not her or anyone in her group. They had spent their entire lives in the Facility._

_If it had another name, she didn’t know it. In here everything was white and sterile, all that remained of the world’s technology contained within it. None of them were ever allowed outside, though she and Irena had snuck out when they were six. It was fortunate that no one had caught them, or they would have been expelled and left to fend for themselves in the wastelands._

_Everyone within the Facility, he noted, was quite young. Almost nobody looked like they could be over thirty. To Anathea, that was just the way things worked, but he caught a word in her thoughts that she didn’t understand: radiation. Perhaps her world was so irradiated that no one could live long enough to grow old. Alfred, by their standards, was a very old man, and Anathea herself was approaching middle-age. They all learned just enough to keep the Facility going, but none knew who had built it, or when, or why._

_She didn’t know who had first posited the idea of time travel, though she suspected Alfred. The entire population eventually agreed to it, and there was much debate as to who should be sent back. Anathea herself was an obvious choice, since she was the only one who had a working knowledge of the languages. Amal was the closest thing they had to a weapons specialist, and Irena was their medic; Anathea suspected that the only reason Janek was sent was because Irena refused to part with him. Lia’s presence she could not explain, but you didn’t question Alfred’s decisions._

_They’d all been highly curious as to just how he meant to do it. One of the books Anathea had read dealt with time travel, but the method used seemed impossible. What she hadn’t known was that the idea of sending someone back to stop the Sentinels had been half of the Facility’s entire purpose. Construction of the machine had begun long before she was born, and only now was it deemed complete._

_The five of them were stood on a long platform, which sat beneath a complicated metal scaffold that didn’t look like any machine she had ever seen. Alfred was last to arrive, grim-faced, jaw clenched so hard she wondered if he was going to crack a tooth. He had a weapon with him, something she only recognized from her books: a handgun. It was very unlike its modern counterparts, which fired EMP bursts instead of bullets. A Sentinel would not be harmed by small pieces of metal, no matter what force projected them._

_The fact that she was the only one who recognized it was probably what allowed Alfred to get away with what he did next. He’d stood his six-year-old daughter on a raised dais facing them -- she was a cute little girl, with his red hair and without his unfortunate facial structure. She gave him a gap-toothed grin, and a cheerful wave goodbye._

_Alfred raised his gun, and pulled the trigger._

When Charles came back to himself, he found Anathea crying silently. “He say he need the energy to power the machine,” she said, her voice thick. “He say if we succeed, her future will be different, because everything will be. That killing her there did not matter.” 

“Anathea...” How to reassure her? Oh, he was appalled by what Alfred had done, but neither she nor her companions could possibly be blamed for it. “Anathea, look at me. What he did was not your fault. You could not have foreseen it, and I’m hardly going to turn out out of the house because none of you could read his mind.”

She was hiccuping, trying to master her tears, a sliver of hope and of wariness in her odd eyes. “You mean it?”

“Yes,” he assured her. “You still have a home here. All of you, except Alfred.”

“What are you be doing with him?” she asked, morbid curiosity seeping into her tone.

“That,” he said, “is a very good question.” Much as he was tempted to let Logan and Erik have at Alfred, that would hardly set a good precedent -- but if not that, then what? They could hardly send the man to jail, seeing as how they couldn’t prove he’d committed any crime. Throwing him out was also tempting, but Charles didn’t trust him not to come back in search of revenge.

He’d speak with Hank and Ororo. Raven, he was quite sure, would simply break Alfred’s neck, though at least that would be far more merciful than anything Logan and Erik might do. Erik might have little use for humans, and little care for what they did to one another, but the man had murdered his own daughter. And Logan wouldn’t hesitate to slice Alfred to ribbons under any pretext. He really hated that man, and now Charles wondered what he smelled whenever Alfred was near.

“Don’t say anything of this meeting,” he said eventually. “Not unless you want to speak with Clarice. She won’t let on.” And she wouldn’t immediately try to slaughter Alfred. She had more restraint than that.

“...Okay.” Anathea’s voice was very small. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, and I mean that,” he said. “If you haven’t had any cinnamon rolls, you should see if Clarice has saved any for you.”

Anathea nodded, and while she left in a hurry, she didn’t quite flee.

Well. Charles highly doubted that was how his own group of people had come to the past. Considering they’d already had Logan as their emissary, there was no point in anyone sending the rest back. The answer to the question of the basement had to lie with Anathea and her people. Their quest had begun with a murder, which would appeal to whatever lurked in the dark.

Damn. Well, before they could even consider going back, he needed to get through his grandfather’s journal. It was not pleasant reading, and he needed a stiff drink before he got started.

\--

By the time Logan and Marie got home with the first load of groceries, the heat was almost blistering, and they discovered that most of the household was laid out on the lawn, a sprinkler passing over them a traveling rain shower. Of course _Alfred_ was absent, and the Professor had said he had some reading to do. No doubt he’d get his fresh air in privacy, away from any prying questions.

Kitty and Magneto were also absent, which was a little...worrisome. If he’d found her in the mood she’d been in earlier -- well, maybe that was why _Alfred_ wasn’t out here, either. Kitty normally was not at all a violent person, but this morning she’d been hurting and angry, and Magneto wasn’t exactly the world’s best influence when it came to...well, anything. If they’d taken it out on _Alfred_...well, Logan couldn’t say he’d mind, but the Professor probably would. And he didn’t want to be around for that shitstorm, should it happen.

“All right, you lazy assholes,” he said, even as he opened the car door. “Lotta stuff here that needs to get in the house. We’re goin’ for another trip this evenin’, so if we didn’t grab anythin’ on the first run, make a list. Some of this needs to get in the fridge about ten minutes ago.”

He wasn’t quite prepared for the response he got. He’d been expecting grumbling, and maybe a bit of profanity, but what he got was an entire group who scrambled to their feet and fell on the sedan like a school of sharks, grabbing paper bags with wet hands and dripping all over everything.

“Guess people are hungry,” Marie said, standing back and leaving them to it. He couldn’t decide if she sounded impressed or disturbed. “You think we could con any of ’em into goin’ out to the store for us later? ’Cause that’s not a trip I wanna make again any time soon.”

“I think we maybe could,” he said, thoughtful. He had a couple candidates in mind. “We probably oughtta make sure they don’t chow that all down before it makes it to the kitchen, though.”

Marie laughed, and slipped her hand into his. They’d gone to more than just the grocery store, and he’d picked her up some sheer silk gloves that made it easy to feel the warmth of her skin through them. She’d bought a few more other clothes, mostly lightweight cotton pants and shirts, and pointed out that they were all going to have to go clothes-shopping pretty soon. They could only wash what they had so many times before it fell apart, but _that_ was a trip he’d happily leave to someone else. He’d stay home with Marie, and maybe they could...think of something else to do.

And he’d thought. Oh, he’d thought plenty, but she didn’t seem ready for that sort of thing yet. As she’d said, they hadn’t even been here a week, and she was still coming off an experience in hell that she had yet to tell him about. Until he knew a little more just where her head was, he wasn’t going to push. His nose hadn’t given him any sign that she was even _thinking_ in that direction, and until it did, he wasn’t going to suggest a thing. However, that didn’t mean he couldn’t be plenty affectionate, and let her know that he was ready when she was. Very ready.

The kitchen, when they finally reached it, was an absolute frenzy. Half of them were trying to put things away, and the other half were just digging through the bags, hunting for whatever they’d personally put on the list. The shark analogy seemed even more appropriate. 

Marie, as ever, seemed to read his mind. “I feel like I should be narratin’ this like a nature documentary,” she said, not bothering to keep her voice down. Given the volume level of the din, nobody was going to overhear her anyway. “The elusive pack of time travelers in their native environment, having a feeding frenzy.”

Logan snorted before he could help himself. ‘Feeding frenzy’ wasn’t very far off. “Darlin’, when you get a second, can you make a sandwich? Peanut butter and whatever else, on wheat. I know someone who’s gonna need it in a bit.”

“Kitty?” she guessed.

“That would be the one. She’s been through here recently, and she’s gotta be sweatin’ Jagermeister. Doubt Magneto knows how to handle such a tiny drunk.”

Marie arched an eyebrow. “You think he’s with her?”

“He was when they came through here. I’ll sniff ’em out and send you in with the sandwich. He won’t get all pissy at you, like he would at me.”

“You sure you still don’t smell...anythin’?” she asked, her voice laced with doubt.

“At this point, I wish I did. It’d be less creepy.”

“If it was anybody else, I’d say it was sweet,” she said. “As it’s _them_...you’re right. Creepy. But whatever works, I guess.”

“Long’s they don’t kill anyone. Well, except maybe _Alfred_.” Seriously, _that_ guy was even creepier than those two. He almost never left his room: one of his group always brought him his meals. It didn’t smell like he was doing anything stupid in there, so Logan didn’t have just cause to search through it. Not that that normally would have stopped him, but he knew the Professor wouldn’t be down with just rummaging through his shit because they could.

Though Anathea and her people looked (and smelled) like a giant weight had been lifted off their shoulders. They weren’t half so skittish now -- they acted a lot more like regular kids. Something had happened there, and he meant to find out what. 

Marie darted forward as soon as there was an empty space at the counter, shoving people out of the way when they bumped into her. It only took about thirty seconds for them to automatically start moving around her, as though they were water and she was a rock. She actually hummed while she worked, and Logan shook his head. Out of everybody here, at least she wasn’t nuts.

Kitty’s boozy trail led outside, away from the yard and its nice cold lawn. Once his errand was over, he was going to go enjoy it himself, and hoped Marie would join him in one of her new outfits. Now that she had spare clothes, she could actually do things like that. And the thought of seeing her in wet cotton...well, that was a nice side benefit. 

He just had to find these two idiots first. Unless he was mistaken -- and when it came to scenting, he never was -- Kitty wasn’t the only one who’d been drinking. If Magneto was too drunk to go to the store later, he was going to be really pissed.

They’d hiked quite a ways for a pair of drunks. When he finally found them, they’d set up some weird kind of camp in the roots at the base of a tree, complete with several empty liquor bottles. There was a small pond in front of it, and Kitty was throwing twigs and last year’s acorns into it, watching them splash. For some goddamn reason Logan didn’t want to speculate, they were both soaking wet.

She didn’t smell like tears anymore, which was a plus. Magneto smelled like alcohol and anxiety, both of which were fairly easily -- if surprisingly, in the case of the second -- explained. If Logan didn’t know better, he’d swear the asshole did _want_ to help, but didn’t know _how_ , and was rather afraid of fucking it up. It would explain why, for once, he was keeping his trap shut: he actually gave a shit. He was trying, in some weird, emotionally-stunted way, to be comforting. And, weirder still, it seemed to be working. Always before, after the Tara nightmares, Kitty had been messed up for at least the next day, but now she was calm, if not happy.

Like Logan kept saying. Creepy.

Well, he’d found them. He left as silently as he’d come, wondering if that was going to blow up in everyone’s faces sooner or later. Marie could deal with them now, since they’d actually let _her_ do it.

\--

The alcohol, Kitty thought, helped, but it could only do so much. The real help had been Magneto’s silence -- something he was not famed for, at least among their little group. He listened -- at least, she assumed he listened to at least some of it -- to her drunken ramblings about Tara, about the horrors of the future and everyone they’d lost. The Sentinels were bad enough, but what had been far worse, she said, were the things she’d had to do to other people. She’d cried her eyes out again, and he’d awkwardly patted her shoulder in what she was pretty sure was an attempt at comfort rather than attempted murder, looking about as comfortable as a cat in a bath.

“Thanks, dude,” she said eventually, wiping her eyes on her sleeve and taking another sip off her bottle. “I mean it. In the future, we don’t really have a chance to cry. Guess I had to get it out of my system sooner or later. And I don’t think anyone else would just _listen_ , you know what I mean? Most people, you tell them about bad shit, and they don’t want to just listen, they want to fix it, and sometimes that’s just...not what you need. Sometimes you need someone to vent to.”

“ _I’m_ certainly not going to try to fix anything,” he said, marginally less uncomfortable now that the scary scary emotions were being reined in.

“Tell anybody I said this and I’ll kick you in the kidney, but I kind of like that about you,” she said. “You don’t _hover_ like...well, everyone. They all seem to think I’m going to explode if I sneeze or something, thanks to my stupid ribs. Which, I know it just means that they care, but sometimes it can sort of smothering.”

“I wouldn’t know,” he said dryly, and she was pretty sure that alcohol was entirely what fueled _that_ admission. “There hasn’t been a surfeit of _care_ in my life since my mother died.” He said it so flatly, so matter-of-factly, and she winced. Well, that was...awkward. What could she say to that?

“Yeah, but have you actually _wanted_ it?” she asked, shrewd even through her alcoholic haze. “I mean, you’re not exactly Mister Approachable. You don’t make friends by glaring at people.”

“I don’t need friends,” he snapped -- far too defensively, at least in her opinion.

“Bullshit.” Kitty tipped her bottle upside down, trying to get the last few drops out of it. “You might not want friends, but you do need them. Everybody does, or they turn into complete weirdos.” She was good, and actually managed not to add, _Like you_. 

“One does not die of loneliness,” he said, and it sounded like he was quoting something.

“Maybe not, but it’s no way to live. And in the future I came from, wandering off to get some solitude _could_ get you killed. Besides,” she added, “if you _really_ wanted to be by yourself, you would have left me bawling my eyes out in that tree, and you didn’t. So yeah.” She’d had a point, but she was no longer sure what it was. Her head was too busy rocking.

He arched an eyebrow at her. “Well, as you said, I’m not a total asshole.”

She burst out laughing. Somehow, with his rather cultured accent, the word ‘asshole’ was hysterical. “Say that again,” she said, trying not to fall over.

“Say what?” he asked, not bothering to hide his bewilderment.

“Say ‘asshole’ again,” she clarified, insofar as she could say anything between giggles.

He looked at her like she’d gone absolutely mad. “I am not saying asshole again,” he said, and pinched the bridge of his nose when she just laughed harder, and actually _did_ fall over. “I know, I know, I just did.”

“Never thought I’d see the day where Magneto said ‘asshole’,” she snickered, righting herself. “You’re officially a plebe. Congratulations.”

“Erik,” he said, hanging his head in what she interpreted as defeat. “My name is Erik. You all use ‘Magneto’ like it’s a curse.”

“Well, from our perspective, it sort of is,” she pointed out. “All of us who came here from the future. I mean, we all know that you’re not him yet, but they haven’t spent the last few days throwing croutons at you and having them thrown back. They know, but they don’t _see_ it. Give them time.”

“If they all react like you, I think I might prefer them thinking of me as a time bomb,” he said, dry as burnt toast. “I couldn’t handle another person like you.”

“I’m going to take that as a compliment, even though I know it isn’t one,” she retorted, almost primly. “You’re too sober. If I can kill a fifth of Jager, you can at least finish three quarters of that.”

“I still can’t believe you drank all of that,” he said, taking a swig of whiskey. “Were did you _put ___it? You’re so --”

“Don’t say it,” she warned.

“-- tiny. I’m sorry, but you really are ridiculously small. I thought future generations were meant to be taller.”

Kitty scowled at him, doing her level best to imitate his glare. “I’ll bite your kneecaps off,” she threatened.

“Human teeth would be far too ineffective,” he said, with all the smugness of half a bottle of booze.

“I’m sure this place has a chainsaw somewhere,” she said, trying to sound dangerous, and knowing, even through her drunkenness, that she completely failed. Struggling to her feet, she looked down at him and smirked. “I’m not that little.”

He stumbled when he stood, but that was okay. She was sort of counting on the fact that he towered over her, because it meant he’d fall harder when she shoved him in the chest.

Fall he did, with an extraordinarily undignified sound she could only describe as a squawk. His expression as he overbalanced was absolutely priceless, but she didn’t get to savor it for long -- he grabbed her wrist, probably on instinct, and yanked her into the pond after him.

_At least the water’s cold_ , she thought as she broke the surface, spluttering, ready to choke the life out of him, but he was laughing. _Laughing_. If he’d been mocking her, she could easily have made good on her intention, but it wasn’t. He was actually having fun, and strangling him now would be like murdering a puppy.

“Just for that,” she said, trying to tread water, “you’re getting the rest of ‘Go the Fuck to Sleep’ tonight.”

“That was worth it,” he retorted, hauling himself up onto the shore. Kitty scowled, and almost ran into the tree when she slogged her way free herself. “And just for _that_ , you don’t get any whiskey.”

She snorted, trying to wring out her hair. “Someone’s going to murder us for that, I’m sure. Both those bottles were probably worth more than my soul.” She winced as she sat, kicking her wet shoes off onto the grass. “We should hide the empties, but it means you’ve got to put that one out of its misery.”

“So long as you don’t try to drown me again,” he said, taking another long draw off the bottle.

Kitty snorted as he passed it to her. So much for cutting her off. “Erik, trust me, if I wanted to drown you, you’d be dead. Now finish that soldier off before somebody comes looking for us.”

\--

When Logan made it back to the kitchen, it was mostly empty. All he did was shake his head and start slapping together a second sandwich, looking somewhere between pained and amused.

“Don’t ask,” he said, wrapping the sandwich in a paper towel. “You’ll see. I’ll see if I can come up with somethin’ for dinner, before the herd comes back.”

Marie laughed. “You do that. Don’t think I could stand bein’ in this heat another second. I wonder what year the Professor gets air conditionin’ in here.”

“Hope it’s this one,” Logan grunted, digging a paper shopping bag out from under the sink. He added two bottles of water, then held it out for the sandwiches. “You’re gonna want that. Just be sure neither pukes on you. I was gonna send ’em to the store, but I don’t think that’s gonna happen tonight. I’ll see if ’Ro and Clarice want a turn.”

“Go out in that hot car when they could spend more time in the grass? Good luck. Either we go again tomorrow, or we send the drunks out when they’re too hungover to protest.”

Logan gave her a grin, one of his wicked grins that did strange things to her knees. “Darlin’, you’re evil.”

“Learned from the best, didn’t I?” she said, and he laughed as he followed her out the doors.

“That way,” he said, turning her to face north. “Just keep goin’ until you step on ’em. Then haul ass back here and we can go have a picnic.”

Marie raised her eyebrows. Coming from anyone else, that probably would have sounded at least marginally innocent, but as it was Logan, she wondered just what the hell he planned to bring on a picnic. Hopefully it was more than just salami and Wild Turkey, if the Professor even had such a cheap drink in his house. “Sugar, sometimes you freak me out a bit,” she said. “All right, I’ll be back.”

She headed out, kicking off her shoes and luxuriating in the feel of the cool, wet grass beneath her feet. One of the advantages of having so few people in the school was that she didn’t have to be nearly so careful of her clothing as she always had been. The risk of bumping into someone was minimal, and it made her feel free in a way she hadn’t since before her mutation manifested. She still wore long sleeves and gloves, but didn’t bother with a scarf or any other, heavier clothes. Logan was trying to talk her into leaving the gloves off when it was just them in their room, but old habits died hard, and if she was awake without them on, she felt weirdly naked.

Not that he’d probably mind _that_. She saw the way he looked at her, when he thought she wasn’t looking, and it warmed her inside -- even if they couldn’t do anything about it. Most people, men and women, looked at her like she was walking poison, some so blatantly that on her cynical days, she’d wondered if she should tattoo the bio-hazard symbol on her forehead. Oh, her friends didn’t, but neither did they look at her like she was a woman.

Bobby had tried. He really had. He’d _wanted_ to see her like an actual, desirable human female, but in the end, he too had been scared of her. She couldn’t exactly hold it against him, especially since, even all that time, he wasn’t really the one she’d been wanting. She’d spent way too much time thinking Logan was out of her reach, too afraid to speak.

The camps had changed that. There wasn’t much she was afraid of anymore -- granted, the things that did scare her absolutely _terrified_ her, but any uncertainty about personal relationships had been burned out of her. She’d learned to grab what she could, because it might not be there tomorrow, and she’d be damned if she’d let go, ever. The camps had taught her strength, too -- not of body, since in so many ways she was still weak as a kitten -- but of mind. 

At first, she’d held out for hope of escape; later, hanging on was the only method of defiance still at her disposal. They wanted a cow, a dumb, docile animal to provide samples as necessary, and sit quietly when not needed. And she did know how to sit quietly when she had to, but she watched, her eyes following her captors’ every move. It unnerved them, she knew, as did her refusal to speak. They’d called her inhuman, referred to her as a thing, but she made sure they knew damn well that she was aware, and alive, and so very angry. 

Her mind started to wander after the first year, traveling afar when she was in her cage, but always, always it returned when they came for her, and her stare would fix on them like a laser. She’d trained herself to blink as little as possible, and that too worked. They needed her, but they feared her, too -- and she now feared very little.

She was, however, still capable of being incredibly weirded out, and when she found her pair of wayward drunks, she was. She really, really was. Both were soaking wet, and appeared to be arguing about who could skip a rock furthest across the pond. Each had an empty bottle of liquor at their bare feet -- Christ in a sidecar, had they really had one each? How the hell was Kitty still conscious? She didn’t want to know.

“All right, you lunatics,” she said, shaking her head, “you’d best eat these before you get back to the mansion, or the Professor might kill you both. Even if he doesn’t, Logan’ll laugh at you.” It was really a far more dire prospect than it sounded. 

Both jumped, and looked at one another. Kitty dissolved into helpless laughter, and Magneto covered his face with one hand. “Please tell me the entire household doesn’t know we’ve come out here and drank ourselves halfway to oblivion.”

“Just Logan and me,” Marie assured him. “Eat these, drink those, and try to get back before dinner or you’ll never hear the end of it. You are both gonna feel so awful tomorrow.” And not just because of the hangover. If her theory was right, Kitty would be seeing that Tara again tonight, and hair of the dog wouldn’t be possible tomorrow morning. Not without risking liver failure, anyway.

“Thanks, Rogue,” Kitty said. “Seriously. I owe you, and so does he, though good luck getting him to cough up anything. Unless it’s pond water.”

“I’m right here,” he said, taking a sandwich out of the bag.

“I know. But I’m pretty sure you did snort water out your nose.”

“I will neither confirm nor deny that.”

Marie rolled her eyes. “Just chow on those, okay? If you turn up late and everybody makes fun of you, I won’t be responsible for it.”

Kitty snickered. “No, no you won’t. We’ll get there, eventually.”

Marie sighed, and turned back. Logan was right -- it would have been a lot less weird if it was actually something conventional.

Would he ever shove her into a pond? Hell no. They actually respected each other, which she suspected couldn’t be said of those two. She knew she could depend on him for anything, that if she needed him, he’d be there, no matter what. She always had felt safe with him in a way she never did with anyone else, no matter how good a friend they were. It wasn’t just because it harder to hurt him with a casual touch, though that contributed. He would never judge her, would never pull away out of fear. 

And he wouldn’t push for anything before she was ready -- which she wasn’t, just yet. She was still trying to get used to human contact in general, and it really didn’t help that her experience in that department was severely limited. Oh, she’d heard the other girls talk, and she and Bobby had sort of tried some things, but she’d been even more worried about it than he was. 

Maybe she needed some advice. Her options in that department were also limited -- Ororo was the only one she’d trust. Clarice and Kitty would be too busy being happy that she was finally doing something about the Rogue-and-Logan Situation, as Kitty had once put it before they all left the school. Ororo would be able to look past that, and give more practical advice. She was also unlikely to be embarrassed by anything Marie might ask.

But...later. She and Logan had a picnic to go on, and she’d force him to join the communal sleeping area -- and not just because it would be entertaining. She needed some sleep herself, and she could actually get some if she had other people around to watch Logan, too. They just needed a corner where he wouldn’t shank anyone with his claws.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alfred, Alfred, they are going to figure out what to do with you, and it won’t be pretty. It will probably be the first, last, and only time Erik and Logan actually agree on something. And congratulations, Erik, you actually managed to be useful -- even if it was mostly by accident.
> 
> 'One does not die of loneliness' is paraphrased from _I Heard the Owl Call My Name_ by Margaret Craven. It's an absolutely fantastic book, and I wholeheartedly recommend it.


	23. Stay the Fuck Asleep

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which the profane bedtime story continues, Raven is surprisingly domestic, Marie is devious, and Charles is an all-around genius.

Charles abandoned his reading and actually went downstairs for dinner. He’d been so troubled by what Anathea had shown him, and what he’d discovered in his grandfather’s notes, that he had to see his household again in person. He had to remind himself that, for now at least, they were all right. Or, as all right as any of them could be.

Anathea and her group took up one end of the table, staying near Clarice -- Clarice, who he still needed to talk to, but it would have to wait until his own mental equilibrium had restored itself. Ororo, tired but calmed by their time on the lawn, sat facing her, with Hank beside her, and Raven sitting opposite to him. Poor Hank was still quite tired, but he was no longer exhausted. Kitty’s idea had had some limited success, at least.

Kitty herself was both suspiciously damp and, try though she might to hide it, very, very obviously drunk. Erik seemed less so, but Charles suspected it was simply because he had the advantage of their sheer differential in body mass. A quick glance at their minds revealed that they were both more or less fine, physically and mentally, so he didn’t feel the need to worry just yet.

At least Logan and Marie were completely happy. Marie especially practically radiated joy, and Charles hoped it would prove infectious. The nightmare-sufferers would no doubt need it.

The food smelled delicious -- barbecued hamburgers and potato salad. The entire meal had been put together, he discovered, by Hank and Raven, under the careful supervision of Clarice. Good -- they were wise enough to realize that they were all going to need to learn whatever basic skills their current education lacked.

He needed to talk to Marie and Logan later, but he wouldn’t poison their contentment just yet. He’d planned to talk to Erik, too, but he wasn’t going to follow through with that unless the man sobered up first. It wasn’t as though Alfred was going anywhere -- Charles had put him into a deep sleep as soon as Anathea had left the office, and he wasn’t going to wake up any time soon. Charles would get Logan to move him into the bunker after dinner.

This policy of telepathic non-interference needed to end. As invasive as it was, he couldn’t risk letting in another viper, another Alfred. His own people he trusted, but Anathea’s group was another story. They each needed to have a thorough inspection, no matter what -- though the fact that he didn’t speak their language would be a hindrance. Their vocabulary lists helped, but they were by no means comprehensive.

Anathea looked at him, her eyes troubled but resigned. She was so intuitive that he wondered if she had some kind of very weak, latent telepathic ability, buried under generations of strictly human genetics. She’d always been wary of Alfred without knowing why, and there was perhaps a reason she avoided some members of his own group more assiduously than others. Some, like Erik, she’d seen as violent firsthand, but not all of them. He’d keep an eye on her, too, though out of curiosity rather than distrust.

Mercifully, they somehow got through dinner without any food being thrown, though Logan had rather more beer than was probably necessary. Charles was hardly one to talk, given that he’d all but pickled himself for the last five years, but still. It bothered him. The last thing they needed were for half of them to turn into alcoholics -- but if things kept on as they had, if it took too long to prepare for the basement and the nightmares lingered all the while, they might all be driven to drink. At least Logan could hold his liquor, unlike two other people Charles could name. It might be the result of his mutation, but it might also just be years and years of practice.

The sheer quantity of food was making quite a few of them sleepy, something no doubt not helped by interrupted nights. He intended to stay with them all this time, to watch over their nightmares in the hope that he could do...well, anything.

Raven looked at Hank, who was nodding off where he sat. She stood, grabbed his plate and hers, depositing them in the sink before grabbing his arm and all but dragging him after her. He was wise enough that he didn’t protest.

Marie barely managed to choke back a laugh, and Logan didn’t bother trying. It would probably be some time yet before either tried to sleep, but both Clarice and Ororo looked dead on their feet. The latter shooed the former out of the kitchen, taking care of their dishes with efficient tidiness. Neither Erik nor Kitty looked ready to collapse, but it was only a matter of time.

_Logan, Marie, if I could see you a moment, he said, wheeling himself out into the hallway. I need your assistance._

They shared a worried glance, but followed. “Somehow, I doubt you need help for anythin’ good,” Marie said, once they were well out of earshot.

Charles sighed. “No,” he admitted, “I don’t. I spent some time with Anathea this morning, and learned a few things about Alfred that make me unwilling to leave him free to roam the house. I can’t keep him asleep indefinitely or he’ll starve.”

“And that’s a problem how?” Logan muttered. “Professor, he smells so wrong that if it wasn’t for you, I’d’ve gutted him as soon as we caught him. It ain’t just violence. Now that Anathea actually trusts us, I don’t see the point in keepin’ him around.”

Well, that was predictable. Logan was a good man, but a little prone to doing bodily harm to anyone he saw as a threat. “Unless I’ve changed very much in the future, you know that’s not how I do things,” he said. “And in any event, I need to know more. If I have to pull some memories out of his mind, I need him alive. 

“However, that doesn’t mean I want him _free_. Now, I can guide him to the bunker, but if I were to provide food and water to him on my own, it would take far too long. And I would like...backup, in case something goes wrong.”

“Bunker?” Marie asked.

“Something my stepfather built. It will serve as a very good prison, and it’s big enough that we can store plenty of supplies in it, without having to continually open the door. I have a feeling that what I saw in Anathea’s memories was nowhere near all of it, but I don’t have the fortitude to deal with him just now.”

He wouldn’t have admitted that to many people, but Marie and Logan knew him so well already that they probably wouldn’t be surprised. His future self counted them as allies for a reason.

“Sure thing, Professor,” Logan said. “You wanna deal with this now?”

“I think it would be best. There’s no need to tell the others yet.”

Logan snorted. “Somehow, I don’t think they’d mind. None of ’em seems to like him much, and they’re all scared of him. Knowin’ he’s outta the way might be a relief.”

“You’re probably right, but I’d still rather keep this to ourselves, for now.”

When they found Alfred’s room, the man was as deeply unconscious as Charles could render him, short of putting him in an actual coma. Even asleep, there was something almost tangibly unpleasant about him, some dark, unnatural twist in his soul.

He hadn’t actually been up to anything nefarious in the last few days. He’d built no weapons, nor had he destroyed anything, but that was not reassuring. Given what Charles had seen in Anathea’s mind, it almost certainly meant he was just keeping all his plans to himself.

“Here’s a hundred-eighty-pound sack of useless,” Logan grunted, lifting him as though he weighed no more than a sack of rice. “You _sure_ we can’t just get rid of him? Because I really, really don’t like what I’m smellin’ off him. It’s not natural.”

“No,” Charles said. “We put him in the bunker, and figure out what to do from there. We all need another conversation with Anathea, before we make any sort of decision.”

Logan very obviously didn’t like it, but Charles knew he’d comply with the edict anyway. Unlike Erik, Logan was actually capable of listening to reason, even if he personally disagreed with it.

Marie snuck back into the kitchen, checking to see if the others had gone. It was completely deserted, and it looked like most of them had actually got their dishes within screaming distance of the sink. It was a start, at least.

She pulled a large wicker basket out of the pantry, filling it with non-perishable food -- crackers, bread, fruit, and even some chocolate. Several bottles of water completed the package...which she then couldn’t lift.

“Hang on a second,” she said, rifling through the pantry. She came out with a big bottle of vegetable oil, and poured a generous helping onto the floor in the corner. Logan’s confusion was obvious, at least until she dragged the basket over and swirled it around on the puddle. Four dishcloths -- tied into a rope -- were attached to one handle, and she gave Logan a grin that was three parts proud and one part evil.

“Ingenuity at its finest,” Charles said dryly, but he meant it. “Let’s get this over with.”

The basket squeaked as it dragged over the hardwood, and he was quite glad there was no one around to see them. They must present quite a ridiculous sight, even by the standards of this household.

The air outside was still far too hot, the humidity disgusting. At least the interior of the bunker was cool enough, and once Alfred actually woke, he wouldn’t die of heat stroke. It would be a while yet, however, and in that time Charles had to figure out just what to do with him. He couldn’t stay in there _forever_ , after all.

“Logan, Marie, if you could keep this to yourselves for now, I would appreciate it,” he said, as they headed back to the house. “Anathea will deal with her people, but I don’t want any more of ours in on it yet. It’s not that I don’t trust them, but...well, I don’t trust them. Some more than others.”

“You mean Magneto and Raven,” Marie said. “Both of ’em might be nothin’ like saints, but I can’t see either of ’em just sittin’ back and lettin’ a child murderer live near ’em. Not as they are now, anyway,” she added, and Charles didn’t need to read her mind when her tone said so much. How many children had they both killed, in the future? Had they even thought about it?

Surely they would not go down that path now. He had to hope not. Neither were stupid -- knowing what their future actions had wrought had to make them stop and think, if nothing else. Until the basement was dealt with, it wasn’t as though they would have the energy to concoct anything like an evil scheme. 

“I’m going to stay with you all, tonight,” he said. “I want to see if I can help with the nightmares. If Kitty’s idea had some effect, perhaps I can add to it.”

Logan raised an eyebrow. “You sure you wanna deal with that circus, Professor?” he asked. “It was probably bad enough last night, and it’ll only be worse with Marie and I.”

“And not just because he’s got the patience of a damn flea,” Marie said, elbowing him in the ribs. “Although at least there’s kittens.”

“Darlin’, you are not makin’ this sound any better,” he grumbled. “Bein’ stuck in that room full of lunatics’d be bad enough without bein’ stomped on by a bunch of walkin’ furballs.”

“You make it sound like I’m askin’ you to drink Windex. If we’re in there, I can get some sleep, too, since I won’t be the only one watchin’.”

 _And there it goes,_ Charles thought. Logan would now put up with it even if all the kittens decided to sleep on his face.

“Fine,” he said. “But you owe me.”

“’Course I do. Professor, I’ll try and stake out a good corner for you, if that’s even possible now.”

“Thank you, Marie.” Well. Even if he couldn’t actually be of any use, at least this would probably be...interesting.

\--

Once again, Clarice and Hank were asleep within moments, despite the fact that the kittens spent a good fifteen minutes crawling all over them. Once again, Magneto was resisting, and a still-drunk Kitty was beginning to lose her patience.

“I did warn you,” she said, looking down at him with an expression that was distinctly disparaging. 

“The cubs and the lions are snoring  
Wrapped in a big snuggly heap  
How come you can do all this other great shit  
But you can’t lie the fuck down and sleep?”

Magneto put his hands over his face, but Ororo could hear him laughing.

“The seeds slumber beneath the Earth now  
And the crops that the farmers will reap  
No more questions!  
This interview’s over!  
I’ve got two words for you, kid  
Fucking sleep!”

It was at this moment that the door opened, and Logan gave the entire room an extremely suspicious glance. Behind him, Rogue had pressed her hand to her mouth, trying to swallow her laughter.

“What the fuck did I just walk in on?” Logan asked. At least he kept his voice down, so the others didn’t wake up.

“A bedtime story,” Kitty said brightly. “I started it last night.”

“And is apparently making good on her threat to finish it,” Magneto groaned, hands still over his face.

“Still not goin’ anywhere, sugar,” Rogue said, giving Logan a pointed look. He just sighed, and dragged in a mattress. No, two mattresses -- who else was staying?

“It sounds like a singularly...interesting one,” the Professor said. “Please, Kitty, continue while we set up.”

Kitty all but cackled.

“The tiger reclines in the simmering jungle  
The sparrow has silenced her cheep  
Fuck your stuffed bear!  
I’m not getting you shit!  
Close your eyes  
Cut the crap!  
SLEEP!”

Marie snorted into her hand, and even Logan looked amused, but the Professor...oh, that was an expression Ororo was never going to forget. Ever. 

“Kitty, did you really memorize that entire damn thing?” Logan asked, somehow squeezing both mattresses onto the already-crowded floor.

“Hell yeah I did. I don’t know if you noticed, but there wasn’t a whole lot to laugh about in the future.”

He shrugged. “Fair enough. Marie, darlin’, gimme those sheets, will you?”

“Watch out for the kittens,” Kitty said, even as one tried to climb Logan’s left leg. She grinned, and picked up her own.

“The flowers doze low in the meadows  
And high on the mountains so steep  
My life is a failure!  
I’m a shitty-ass parent!  
Stop fucking with me, please!  
And sleep!”

Marie, hands still full of sheets, rested her head against Logan’s chest, her laughter shaking her shoulders. The Professor was biting his lip so hard Ororo was certain it would start bleeding if he didn’t stop.

“Are you quite finished?” Magneto asked, words muffled by his hands.

“Are you quite asleep?” Kitty retorted. “Didn’t think so.”

“I’m working on it,” he said, lowering his hands and giving her a look that was most definitely pained. “Give me a moment.”

She narrowed her eyes. “All right.You have one minute. If you’re still awake after that, I’m finishing the story.”

“If this is how shit worked last night, I’m amazed anyone slept at all,” Logan grumbled, ignoring Kitty and Marie’s vicious glares. 

“Not helpin’, sugar,” Marie said quietly. “C’mon and help me get this set up. I promise I won’t tell you any bedtime stories.”

“I’d hope not.”

Ororo rolled her eyes, looking at Clarice while they got the Professor set up as well. The black-and-white kitten from the night before had once again decided her hair was an ideal bed, and was purring away like a tiny motorcycle. Hank had two sitting on him -- one was asleep, while the other chewed on its own tail. Raven, looking tired but not unhappy, sat beside his head, one hand on his hair.

She herself was sleepy, but not exhausted. Content to let a kitten snooze on her lap, she watched dusk fall on the yard outside, listening to Logan grumble almost inaudibly. He only shut up when he had Marie next to him, his head in her lap. 

He was still wide awake, however, so it was a good thing Kitty drifted off herself, or he might have been subjected to further torment. While Kitty undoubtedly needed the rest, especially after a day of drinking, Ororo was hesitant to let her sleep. Most of them had nocturnal company to look forward to, but not Kitty. Why the hell had whatever sent them all these nightly visitations picked _Tara_ to send to the poor woman? It wasn’t like they didn’t have any number of departed friends to choose from. To Kitty, Tara represented nothing but failure, which was hardly productive.

She glanced at the Professor, who had taken out what looked like a large diary. Apparently he wasn’t planning on sleeping any time soon, either. Kitty was going to talk to him tomorrow, whether she liked it or not -- drinking herself half to death was not something she could do every day.

\--

Eventually, Logan did fall asleep, but only after Marie had spent what seemed like an interminable amount of time petting his hair like he was a cat. Considering the little ginger kitten also wanted her attention, she was pretty occupied for a while.

The Professor was busy reading, Ororo was playing with two of the kittens, and Raven was...knitting? Really? Okay. Well then.

Clarice stirred, brows furrowed, but Ororo put a kitten beneath her hand and she stilled. It was almost enough to make Marie laugh -- Kitty’s theory really wasn’t full of shit. Logan was going to be so annoyed to be told so by an actual firsthand observer. 

The little calico kept trying to climb the length of Hank’s body to sit on his face, and Raven kept pausing her knitting to pick the little fuzzy thing up and set her aside. She also threw a spare ball of yarn at Magneto when he started twitching, still not looking up from her work. If this nightly pattern kept up, Marie might ask her for knitting lessons.

Logan himself was dead to the world, safe behind the Wall she’d given him. His breathing was deep and even, the pulse of his temple beneath her fingertip steady and strong. If the basement-thing showed up in earnest -- if it tried to actually attack him -- she’d know, and then it would be on. 

Kitty shivered, curling into a little ball on the floor. Her tiny white kitten gave a squeak of protest when it was dislodged from her lap, and tried to bite her nose. It didn’t rouse her -- nor did the attempt to chew on her hair.

Marie was about to say something, to attempt to (somehow) wake Kitty without waking Logan, but she didn’t need to. Kitty’s eyes snapped open, and she shuddered, grabbing her kitten and hugging it like a child with a stuffed animal. She’d gone pale as milk, and Marie wondered if she was going to be sick.

“Tara?” Marie whispered, trying to catch her attention.

“Yeah,” Kitty whispered back. “I need a drink.”

“You’ll give yourself alcohol poisoning.” Magneto’s voice was muffled by his pillow, but he had to be at least semi-awake, if he could follow the not-quite-conversation. “It’s just a dream. Go the fuck to sleep.”

Marie never did have any idea how she managed to hold in her laughter. It was totally inappropriate, but hearing him say that, even half-asleep, was goddamn hilarious. His voice was entirely wrong for that sentence.

Kitty must have thought so, too, because she managed a very faint smile, despite the fact that her eyes were suspiciously bright. “Can’t,” she said quietly. “That’s the problem.”

“I know you don’t wanna hear this,” Marie said, “but she’s not gonna go away until you give her a chance to say her piece. Kitty, wherever she’s gone, nothin’ can hurt her anymore. She’s past that, and she just wants to help.”

“What she said,” Magneto mumbled, reaching out blindly with his right hand and almost smacking Kitty in the face. Eventually it found the crown of her head. “Charles will kill me if I don’t stop you pickling yourself with whiskey, so go the fuck to sleep and get it over with.” 

He rolled over enough to grab his spare pillow and toss it at her. She ducked, and it landed on the kitten, who let out another squeak -- this one quite angry.

“Jackass,” she muttered, sounding much more like herself as she grabbed the pillow, punching it into submission before she laid down. The kitten, still pissed off, climbed her side and tried to sit on her face. She grabbed it, and tucked it against her stomach as she curled up again. “You sleep too, fuzzball.”

Incredibly, that bizarre exchange seemed to be an actual comfort to her, because she was asleep again in minutes.

Marie glanced at the Professor, who could only shrug. At least he seemed to find the whole thing as weird as the rest of them did.

She looked down at Logan, who was still deeply asleep. If anything was harassing him in his dreams, he wasn’t letting on. Yet again, she wondered just who his ‘visitor’ was, who was advising him in his sleep. It couldn’t be anyone traumatic, like Kitty was seeing; while he was good at being stoic, he couldn’t fool her. 

Sooner or later, she was going to need to sleep herself, but she wouldn’t wake Logan unless he did it on his own. She could always nap tomorrow, and sleep through the worst heat of the day.

\--

For once, Charles was making no effort to stay out of anyone’s mind.

He had a theory, but he wasn’t going to say a thing about it until he had a better idea of just what happened to the four in their nightmares. It meant he needed to watch all of them, and try to catch the snatches of nightmare that he could -- for the watchers were very good at waking each before the darkness could fully grip them.

It wasn’t easy, but from what he did see, he thought he was right. If he could link the four, if he could keep them all together to face down the darkness, it might make their return trip easier. None of them were anything like telepathic -- none of them could possibly understand just how the world worked for him, how much of an advantage he really had. They were a quartet of extremely disparate individuals, but if they could work together, if they had access to one another’s minds, they might have a better chance. Clearly, the darkness wanted to isolate them as much as possible, keeping them unable to even imagine the presence of the others. 

His grandfather’s journals had not been encouraging, but at least they’d given him that idea. In his ramblings he called the forces in the basement Memories, with a very distinct capital M. He’d known that something lurked there before he died, but rather than terrify him, it fascinated him. He’d fed it on purpose -- and, unless Charles was very mistaken, he was a part of it now. The thought of facing some shade of that mad, brilliant, unquestionably evil man...well, it wasn’t one he wanted to contemplate yet. Not until he was certain this would (or would not) work.

The Memories fed not just on fear, but on pain, on rage, on the lifetime memory of suffering of each person it caught. Isolating their prey seemed only natural, since most humans seemed to have an instinctive fear of being alone in the dark. If these four were not alone...well, they probably wouldn’t get along in their sleep any better than they did awake, but it would be better than nothing.

It was the rest of them that really troubled him -- all of those who hadn’t been in the basement, but were dreaming of the dead anyway. Where they had come from, and how, were not questions to which he had anything close to an answer.

Marie, Raven, and Ororo were still stubbornly awake, but Kitty wasn’t. Hoping she would forgive him, he crept into her mind, into her unwanted dream.

_He knew very little of Tara, having mostly stayed away from Kitty’s memory. The name apparently belonged to a very small girl, older than she appeared, with ashy skin, a long tangle of black hair, and clear grey eyes. A girl who was very obviously dead._

_She sat at the base of a tall hemlock, facing Kitty, who knelt frozen on a thatch of dead grass. Being an observer of the dream, he could see the poor woman clearly, right down to the half-dried tear-tracks on her face._

_“Do you have to appear to her like that?” he asked, Tara, more harshly than he intended. “Let her see the girl she loved, not the one she watched die.”_

_Tara blinked, and so did Kitty, turning her face to him. “Professor?”_

_“I apologize, Kitty, but I need to speak with someone’s visitor other than my own, and you seemed...distressed. My question stands,” he added, eyeing Tara. “Surely you can show yourself to her in some better form.”_

_“I don’t know how,” the girl said. “There’s things she has to know, and I have to tell them, but if there’s any other way I can look, I don’t know how to do it.”_

_She sounded so upset that Charles relented. “Are you in pain, where you’ve come from?” he asked, thinking of what Marie had said._

_Tara shook her head. “No. That’s the thing, Kitty, I’m okay now. I’m okay, and I need you to listen so_ you’ll _be okay, too.’_

_Kitty swallowed, and Charles knew what she wasn’t capable of articulating. Logically she knew that Tara was beyond harm now, but the evidence of her eyes made her doubt. The vividness of the dream could not be helping, either: it wasn’t just dream, it was memory, and a horrible one at that._

_“May I?” he asked, kneeling beside her. She gave him a curious look, but nodded._

_Carefully, he placed his hands over her eyes. Her eyelashes were damp and sticky with tears. “Speak to her, Tara. Kitty, just focus on her voice. I’m right here.”_

_Tara hesitated a moment. “It’s not enough, that you all go down there,” she said. “Some of you are stronger than others, and in different ways. This time, you need to be the Sentinels -- you have to be able to find them and each other. And remember Lee.”_

_Kitty stiffened, and a flood of pain and fury washed through her. “What about him?” she snarled._

_Tara’s eyes were so full of sorrow it hurt to look at. “What happened to him. You might have to do it again, and sooner than you think.” She swallowed. “You’re not alone this time, Kitty, and now isn’t then. Just...don’t forget that, okay?”_

_“I won’t,” Kitty said, little more than a whisper. “Tara...you’re really okay where you are now, right? You’re not just...saying that?”_

_Charles uncovered her eyes. She might, he thought, need to see Tara for this._

_“I am. I promise. I know I don’t look like it, but it’s good, Kitty. Just be careful, because you’re not supposed to come here with me any time soon.”_

_Kitty swallowed hard, her eyes glistening, but she nodded. It was, he knew, what she needed to hear._

_“Kitty, will you be all right if I leave you now?” he asked gently, and she nodded._

_“Thanks, Professor. I’ll...I’ll be okay now.”_

Charles blinked. If last night’s dream had been anything like that, it was no wonder she’d spent the day getting steadily more drunk. The memories, the feelings associated with it, were almost strong enough to make him ill. Tara had intended to be a comforting presence, but all she’d done was remind Kitty of what the poor woman considered the worst failure of her life. He could practically taste her guilt and anguish, but with any luck, her subsequent dreams wouldn’t be so awful.

Be the Sentinels...he didn’t yet know enough about them to be able to understand just what that meant. His best guess was that Tara was saying, in a roundabout way, more or less what he’d been thinking: they had to be able to find each other. The Sentinels targeted mutations, so perhaps that was how they needed to start. It still left tracking Anathea’s group a problem, since they were all human, but it was a beginning. And it was certainly better than nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is Charles right? He’s Charles, he’s rarely actually _wrong._ We have not seen the last of Tara, who has a bone to pick with Alfred from the afterlife on someone else’s behalf. Logan and Erik will find out just what Alfred did, and it will be...interesting. No fun, but interesting.


	24. From the Days of Future Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which there are hangovers, a very wise Marie, a very angry Charles, and much is revealed about Alfred and his Bad Future.

When Logan woke, he found Marie sound asleep beside him. She stirred a little when he sat up, frowning, but snuggled down again when a kitten crawled into the space he vacated. Damn furballs.

Apparently he’d actually managed a decent night’s rest, because the sun was already well up. The others were all asleep -- including Raven, who had a pair of knitting needles beside her, and a scarf three-quarters the length of her body that was providing a bed for three kittens.

What.

The Professor was gone -- if he’d decided to bail last night, Logan wouldn’t at all have blamed him. Might be a good idea to check his office, once breakfast was out of the way, so they could figure out what to do with _Alfred_. Logan wanted to know what the hell had changed, what the Professor had discovered that would make him willing to actually lock up one of his houseguests. 

Clarice, who had a kitten in her hair, looked peaceful, and he hoped the kid really had got some rest. Kitty had one of the little fuzzballs trying to sleep on her face, and he actually listened to her breathing a moment, to make sure the thing hadn’t smothered her. Magneto’s right hand rested on the crown of her head, fingers tangled in her hair like she was one of the cats, and Logan _did not_ want to know.

When he reached the kitchen, he discovered none of Anathea’s group were up and about, either. Since there was nobody to scold him about it, he cracked a breakfast beer.

Once again, the nightmare had kept trying to grab him, and once again it failed each time. Marie was a damn good guardian, if that’s even what she could be called. He knew she couldn’t keep it up forever, but he felt more secure in her care than he would even in the Professor’s.

He chugged the beer, belched so loudly he wished he had someone around to scold him for it, and headed off to the Professor’s office. 

\--

Kitty woke up with the mother of all hangovers.

The sunlight stabbed through her eyelids, right into the center of her brain. With a groan, she pushed the kitten off her face, wrestled her hair out of Erik’s fingers (which hurt even more), and crawled to the bathroom, where she shut the door and enjoyed the complete darkness. The catbox needed cleaning, but she just wasn’t up to it right now. She needed approximately a quart of water, as many aspirin as it was safe to take, and a nice cool shower. For all of that, she wanted her own room, once she could actually get to one.

The Professor’s interruption of her dream had...helped. More than helped, but it wasn’t a cure-all. Tara had had more things to say, and Kitty hadn’t liked a damn one of them, but there was shit she had to do, and she needed to be at least marginally human to do it.

Someone knocked on the door. “You dead in there?” Ororo called.

“No,” she replied, and winced. Even the echo of her own voice in her head hurt. “But I sort of wish I was.”

“Stay there. I’ll get you something.”

“You’d better not die.” That was Erik’s voice, and he sounded like he felt about as bad as she did.

“I can’t,” she retorted, crawling to the door and cracking it open a fraction. “Tara told me some things last night -- things about _Alfred_. Need to talk to you about it, because I think they’re going to need our help, once we feel like humans again. Mutants. Whatever, you know what I mean.”

Through the door, she could see he’d only halfway sat up, and was clutching his head much as she had done when she’d woken up. The little white kitten was happily gnawing on his elbow. “Who are ‘they’?” he asked, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands.

“Professor and Logan. Once Logan finds out what _Alfred_ did, we might have a hard time keeping him from killing the bastard. And as much as I’d like to let him, we apparently need him for something. It’s got some damn thing to do with the basement, but of course Tara couldn’t tell me much that was useful.” She paused. “She told me what he did. _All_ of what he did, but I’m not saying anything until coffee and aspirin have happened.”

Ororo, bless her, chose that moment to arrive with both, passing them to Kitty. She took one exasperated look at Erik and left the room again, hopefully for a second round. Ororo was good people: he’d been Kitty’s drinking partner yesterday, so she’d look after him, too.

The aspirin didn’t go down well, but the coffee was like a blessing. Ororo had thoughtfully filled it with cream and sugar, both of which would take the edge off the hangover. She just had to sip it slowly, or her stomach would rebel.

She wanted to ask if he’d dreamed of his mom again, but for once in her life kept her mouth shut. Something told her that was a very private thing, and contrary to what the rest of her companions might think, she was capable of spotting -- and actually respecting -- personal boundaries. When she absolutely had to, anyway.

Ororo returned with Erik’s coffee, and received a rather startled thank-you. He’d better enjoy it while he had a chance, because the Professor wasn’t going to wait forever.

\--

Though Charles had only slept a few hours, he wasn’t remotely tired. He was too angry.

Kitty’s friend Tara had come to him, after she left Kitty’s dreams. Sitting comfortably within his mind, she’d told him more about Alfred -- more than he wanted to hear, and a great deal more than he was comfortable with. What Anathea knew, what she had shown him, barely scratched the surface. After everything Tara had to say, Charles was actually tempted to let Logan have at Alfred.

But he couldn’t. Even if it wasn’t a violation of everything he stood for, they needed to take Alfred with them to the basement. Tara had not told him why, but she’d been quite adamant about it. Controlling Erik and Logan would be difficult, but the man needed guarding. He’d been so very docile in all the time they’d been here, but he knew they were on to him now. There was no point in pretending anything anymore.

Unsurprisingly, Logan arrived at the office very early, beer in hand, bright-eyed and wide awake. “Figured I’d better come up,” he said, dragging up one of the armchairs, “about _Alfred._ You know what we’re gonna do with him yet?”

Charles sighed. “I have some ideas, but no,” he said. “We need to wait for the other two. They’ll be along shortly, once they’ve dealt with the hangovers. Kitty knows much of what I discovered last night, and Erik...aside from you, he’s the most ruthless person in this household. I’d rather know where he was, while we’re dealing with this.” A large part of Charles didn’t want let Erik anywhere near this, but in so small a group, he’d find out sooner or later, and letting him in on it now would save the bother of constantly monitoring him in an effort to make sure he didn’t discover anything.

Logan seemed to catch on immediately. “Right. You manage to fix Kitty’s head at all last night?”

“I helped her communicate more effectively with Tara, if that’s what you mean. With luck, she won’t want to go on such a heroic binge of drinking again, and not just because of the hangover. I’ve asked Tara to come to me, too, since she’s far more useful than my father has been. Then again, my mother would have said it was no worse than he’d been in life. She didn’t often speak of him after he died.”

“You’ve got no idea how weird it is, hearin’ you talk about your family like that,” Logan said, shaking his head. “In the future, you never did say much about your life when you were younger, and I never thought to wonder why.”

“I probably didn’t want you to,” Charles said. “I’m sure I wouldn’t want to think much about this point in my life. I’m not exactly proud of who I’ve been, in the last few years.”

“Well, you snapped out of it pretty damn good,” Logan said. “And I don’t say shit like that lightly. Don’t think this circus’d hold together without you.”

Privately, Charles wasn’t sure how long the circus could hold together with him, but that was a concern best left unvoiced.

It wasn’t long before Kitty came creeping in, limping and shielding her eyes from the light. She was most definitely paying for yesterday’s alcoholic activities, though her damp hair indicated she’d at least managed a shower. “Ow,” she muttered, as she climbed into a chair. Though she was obviously hungover, she wasn’t exhibiting any nightmare-induced trauma.

Erik followed shortly after, and while he looked much more composed, a quick check of his mind told Charles he felt awful. Good. Given how murderous he looked, at hangover was possibly the best way to keep him from doing anything about it. Charles wished, oh how he wished, that Kitty hadn’t said anything before the pair arrived. There were things he would have preferred Erik not ever find out.

“So,” Kitty said, leaning forward with her head in her hands, “ _Alfred._ Tara says we can’t kill him, but can we at least hurt him a little?”

“Or more than a little?” Erik muttered, wincing as a ray of sunlight hit his face. Even hungover, the sheer level of his rage, no matter how well contained, was...alarming.

Charles sighed. “Kitty, did you _really_ have to tell him everything?” he asked, trying not to groan.

Logan snorted before she could answer. “Keepin’ anythin’ back would require havin’ anythin’ like a brain-to-mouth barrier. Somebody wanna let me in on this?”

“He didn’t just murder his daughter,” Kitty said, rubbing her temples. “He was a lot like the Professor’s grandfather, actually. Experimented on people until he found a way to power his machine. Tara said it’s why he was the only person over thirty who lived where they all came from.”

“Children, too,” Erik added, and that was the source of his fury. After what he’d suffered at Shaw’s hands, even the torment of a human child affected him. Thank you for mentioning that, Kitty.

“And we _can’t_ kill him?” Logan asked, squeezing his beer bottle so hard that it threatened to shatter.

“No,” Charles said, quite firmly. “Tara was clear on that. He has to go to the basement with us.” Now he was the one who sighed. “I’m going to start setting up everyone’s compartments today. I think I’m familiar enough with Marie’s systems to teach it to the four of you.” He wouldn’t bring up connecting them all until he knew whether or not this stage would actually work. “Tomorrow I’ll need to see everyone else. Alfred is still asleep, so we don’t need to worry about him just yet, but I’ll call you when he wakes. I won’t risk opening the door to physically look in on him, so Kitty, I’ll need your help.”

“You’ll have to wake _me_ up,” she groaned. “I’m going to find a dark room and a kitten, and see if I can’t sleep some of this off.”

“Good luck with that,” Logan muttered. “Professor, you want I should go get Hank?” Logan was evidently smart enough to realize he would be the best one to start with. Charles had known him for years -- and, unlike with Erik, had never wanted to strangle him. There was mutual trust that would make this easier.

“If he’s awake. If not, let him sleep as long as he can. You’ll all want to be as rested as possible, before we attempt this.”

Erik said nothing, but his silence held no belligerence. He was not at all happy about the idea of having Charles in his head, but that went both ways. There was enough darkness in this house already, and Charles didn’t want to see whatever might lurk in the depths of Erik’s mind. Imagining what might be there was bad enough.

\--

By the time Marie got up, it was almost nine-thirty, and she was alone in the room aside from the kittens. The litterbox stank something fierce, so she took care of it, and made sure the little critters had food and fresh water.

The kitchen wasn’t jammed, but neither was it empty. Clarice was demonstrating the art of French toast to Anathea and her crew, answering the questions they rather proudly asked in (somewhat broken) English. The _really_ amusing thing was that Logan was hanging in the background, watching with just as much curiosity, though he pretended to be uninterested.

Magneto lurked at the table, nursing a cup of coffee and looking totally miserable. _What he gets for chugging a fifth if whiskey_ , she thought, pouring herself some coffee. In spite of the hangover he was, as ever, glaring daggers at poor Janek. Now that the kid seemed to have a slight grasp of English, she probably ought to warn him, before Magneto found some way of ‘accidentally’ breaking his arm. That would not go over well with anyone.

She sat across from Magneto, giving him a very pointed look, which he responded to with a glower. She raised an eyebrow in return, sipping her coffee, letting him know very plainly that she was keeping an eye on him.

He shut his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose, and she considered her message well-received. That out of the way, she turned into her own mind, checking on its other occupants.

The thing from the basement was still very well caged. It had fought and fought, beating itself against the walls of its tiny cell, but she was ruthless in her guardianship. For once, all the others were in agreement, and behaved themselves even when she released them into the prison yard. Not even the murderers she’d absorbed in the camps wanted to see that thing break free of containment, so they were actually being _helpful_. It was weirding her out.

“How do you do it?”

Marie blinked. “Huh?”

“How do you do it?” Magneto repeated. “How do you protect Logan so thoroughly? It hasn’t escaped my notice that he sleeps far more soundly than the rest of us.”

Dammit. Why couldn’t he be stupid? “I’ve got...a system. Professor’s gonna teach it to you all. My mutation -- I don’t just drain people’s powers. I get a little piece of them, of their personalities, and the Professor -- my Professor -- taught me how to cage ’em. Used the same method with the thing I pulled outta Logan’s head. It’s still there: it’s just locked up.”

While he looked interested, he also did not look happy, and it was pretty damn easy to guess why. He probably didn’t want the Professor in his head any more than the Professor wanted to be there.

“Don’t be a dumbass,” she said sternly. “You need his help and you know it. If you go down there without bein’ a hundred percent, you might get us all killed. He’s gonna ask to see you soon, and you’d better go. Would you really rather die than let him poke around in your brain for a few minutes?”

He was quiet for so long that it began to legitimately freak her out. “No,” he said at last. “But if you know anything of us in the future, you’ll understand how difficult an idea it is. Several of you have claimed Charles and I reconciled by the time you all were sent here, but I have a hard time imagining _how._ He thinks of me as a monster, and I still believe he’s far too idealistic. I can’t see that ever changing.”

Marie drained the last of her mug. “Time does funny things. Now, I hadn’t seen either one of you for years before I showed up here. Last time I saw you, you were still just the asshole who tried to kill me when I was seventeen, but if you’d _stayed_ that way, the Professor never woulda let you into his group, no matter how dangerous things were. Just...talk to him, will you? Doesn’t have to be about anythin’ that’s already happened. Figure out what you’re gonna do when we go back to France.” 

She sure as hell wasn’t going to tell him to think about what he’d do when that was all over. For the sake of the entire damn future, she hoped he’d stick around the mansion, so the rest of them could keep an eye on him. She didn’t yet trust him not to start something shitty as soon as he ran off, and she doubted anyone else did, either. Hard to break decades of habit in less than a week.

His expression suggested he knew at least some of what she was thinking. Seriously, why could he not just be stupid?

“I’ll consider it,” he said.

“You’d probably better, since you don’t have much time.”

“I know,” he sighed. “None of us do.”

Marie wasn’t sure what he meant by that, and didn’t think she wanted to know.

\--

By the time Logan came to wake Kitty up, the sun was well on its way to evening, and there was a kitten in her hair.

Her head still ached a little, but she felt much better. She still chugged four glasses of water before she left the room, taking the kitten to reunite it with its litter-mates.

“You don’t look quite so shitty,” Logan observed, and smirked when she glared at him. “You gonna be up for this?”

“Do I have much choice?” she groused. “Oh, I know the Professor would let me off if I asked, but somehow I don’t think that would be a good idea. Has anybody checked on _Alfred_ today?”

“Professor’s taken a couple looks at his mind, but he says it’s hard to see through the walls of the bunker. Apparently his crazy-ass stepdad lined ’em with _lead_.”

“Of course he did,” Kitty sighed. “I’m beginning to wonder if anyone in his family was sane before he came along. Maybe there’s a reason he never talked about them.”

“Wonder if there’s any still alive,” Logan said, thoughtful. “I mean, I doubt it, since he’s got all this to himself, but you never know.”

Kitty wasn’t sure if that was a thought she liked. She definitely wasn’t going to ask.

When they met the Professor in the garden, he looked...tired, but he didn’t look discouraged. Whatever he’d done with Hank had to have been at least a little successful, and she hoped that was a good omen. Erik, who stood at a conspicuous distance, looked rather less happy, but like _that_ was anything new. At least he no longer seemed totally hungover. 

It was still hotter than hell, the humidity sticky and miserable, so she wanted to get this out of the way as soon as she could, and then maybe go turn the hose on and lay on the lawn. “Okay, you all know how this works: time to hold hands and sing Kumbaya.”

Both the Professor and Erik gave her totally blank looks, and she rolled her eyes. “Seriously? That song came out like ten or eleven years ago. Whatever. Hands.” She held both of hers out expectantly. She wasn’t tremendously surprised when Erik grabbed her right, since she couldn’t imagine him voluntarily touching either Logan or the Professor. Logan grabbed her left, and rested his other hand on the back of the Professor’s wheelchair. “Okay, in we go.”

All three of them twitched a little when they’d passed through the wall, breaking their human chain with a speed that was almost funny, but they nevertheless zeroed in on _Alfred_ , who was sitting next to a small pile of Granola bar wrappers and an empty water bottle. The hostility with which he met their stares was so palpable she almost flinched. She’d wondered why Anathea wasn’t with them, but now she thought she understood: _Alfred_ would almost certainly try to manipulate her, or at least intimidate her. Lacking her presence, it would be much easier for them to intimidate _him._

“I know you understand more than you let on,” the Professor said. “Don’t bother pretending otherwise. I need to know why so many of you came back. You could have accomplished your goal with three people at the very most, no matter what Anathea thinks.”

The man said nothing, though he was tense -- whether he was poised to attack or run, Kitty didn’t know. She saw Logan’s nostrils flare, scenting him. Whatever he smelled made his fists clench, and she saw the tips of his claws poke at the webbing between his knuckles.

Uh-oh.

The Professor’s eyes widened, the color leeching from his face. “...Oh dear,” he said, regarding _Alfred_ with laser-sharp eyes. “Anathea was wrong.”

“About what?” Logan demanded, not taking his eyes off _Alfred_.

“There _are_ still mutants in the future. You’re looking at one.”

Kitty blinked. “What the hell’s his mutation?”

The Professor was quiet a moment, searching. “Electropathy. Fortunately for us, the locks on this bunker are too primitive for him.”

“For now,” Erik said, under his breath. Logan might not be the one they needed to worry about after all, given the way Erik was glaring. It was all Kitty could do not to kick him in the ankle.

“It gets worse,” the Professor said grimly. “He’s much, much older than he looks. There’s -- I can’t see it all, but there were others before him, experimenting on humans and mutants. I’ll have to look more closely, but one of us created something that’s given him perfect homeostasis.”

“English, Professor,” Logan grunted.

“It means he doesn’t age,” Erik said. “ _Why_ would someone give something like that to _him_?”

The Professor shook his head, his expression one of total disbelief. “So that he would have enough time to undo their mistake,” he said. “So he could discover a way to go back to get rid of Trask, before the first Sentinel War could ever come to pass. You’re looking at one of the scientists who started Sentinel War Two.”

Fortunately, Kitty knew Logan well enough to grab his arm on instinct, before he started to lunge. She even managed to dodge the claws that ripped through his skin without thought or care. “Hold up, Logan,” she ordered. “Professor can’t read his mind if he’s dead. That goes for you, too,” she added, shooting Erik a quelling look. “Just wait. So why’d he bring so many people back with him, Professor? What was the point?”

Again, the Professor was quiet. “He wanted followers,” he said eventually. “He hadn’t counted on the others breaking free as soon as they had the option. He had no intention of living quietly once he’d succeeded. But there was a problem, wasn’t there, Alfred?”

The man’s glare intensified into something outright blistering, but he still said nothing.

“His health started breaking down the day they arrived. He’s spent the last few days trying to figure out what went wrong.”

“So what, he’s dyin’?” Logan asked. “If we really do need to get him to France, we’d better go quick. Unless it doesn’t matter if he’s a corpse or not.”

“We have a little time,” the Professor said. “He’s not dying. He’s just...sick.”

“And dangerous,” Erik muttered. “We can’t count on that lock holding him forever.”

“You’re in the best position to do something about that,” the Professor said, looking like the admission left an actual bad taste in his mouth. “He _is_ dangerous. He has nothing to lose, now.”

“Isn’t that skippy,” Kitty sighed. “Can we go now? That stare is creeping me out.” It really was, too -- it was fixated on the Professor with an intensity that was downright scary.

“I think so. I have all I need.”

Kitty led them back out through the wall, but hung back when Logan and the Professor returned to the house. “Need to talk to you,” she said to Erik, who was eyeing the door thoughtfully. 

“So talk,” he said, waving a hand. The walls beside the door began to buckle, stretching with a screech of metal and a fall of crumbling concrete. They were actually drawing together, creeping over the door, sealing it shut like wax over a wine cork. It sort of made sense -- with her around, it wasn’t like they needed to actually open the door or anything.

“Damn,” she muttered. “Nice. Anyway, I know Tara says we need _Alfred_ alive, but she also told me to remember Lee, and that I might have to do that again soon. I’m pretty sure she was talking about doing it to him.”

“Who’s Lee?” he asked, peering down at her. 

Kitty sighed, and looked away. “The guy whose heart I ripped out. I don’t know how the hell I could keep him _alive_ if I did that, do you? This isn’t _Once Upon a Time_.”

Again, confusion. “What? Frankly, I don’t think that’s possible, but a week ago I would have said the same of time travel. If Tara’s serious, she’ll probably tell you what she means.”

“I guess.” She looked back at him. “Have you gotten to talk to your mother again?” she asked, a little awkward, but also as gentle as she could make it. Hey, she was trying.

“Yes. It’s possibly the only good thing to be found in this...mess.”

For him, it probably was. For Kitty and her crew, things could definitely be a lot worse. “I’m roasting,” she said, after a slightly awkward silence. “Let’s go see if anybody left the hose on again.”

“So long as you don’t finish that ridiculous bedtime story,” he said, with mock solemnity.

“I don’t make promises I can’t keep.”

\--

Marie had been enjoying the wet lawn for a good half hour before Logan joined her, beer in hand. He gave her wet clothing an appreciative glance and a raised eyebrow, and she actually felt herself blushing. She hadn’t thought she had it in her anymore.

“C’mon, sugar,” she said, patting the grass beside her. Water splashed beneath her fingers. “Plenty of room.”

“I can see that.” He nevertheless settled down quite close to her, laying back onto the cold water with a sound that was damn near obscene. And hell, there she went, blushing again. Goddammit.

“I talked to Hank,” she said. “Professor seems to have helped him set up somethin’ like what I’ve got. Clarice’ll probably be next, and then maybe they’ll both have an easier time of it. Told Magneto he needed to get over himself and go through it, too, but I dunno if he’ll listen.”

“Probably will,” Logan grunted. “He’s stubborn and he’s an asshole, but he ain’t stupid. We get all our ducks in a row and I think we might be headin’ back to France by next week.”

Well, _there_ was a thought to wreck her zen. Marie knew it would be best to just get it over with, but the idea still scared the shit out of her. She had no intention of losing him down in that darkness, but she couldn’t keep track of everyone -- and no matter what her granny said, she didn’t have any way to personally make sure they’d all survive. That was the Professor’s territory, not hers.

“It’ll be okay, Marie,” Logan said, resting his hand on her arm, just above where the hem of her sleeve met her wrist. “We’re all a bunch of stubborn fuckers. That thing won’t know what hit it.”

“Well, technically it’ll have to,” she pointed out, “seein’ as it’ll know when we get there. It just won’t live long enough to regret it.”

He laughed. “That’s the spirit.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh Alfred, you little shit. You had best hope Kitty doesn’t need to rip your heart out (though don’t count on it).


	25. Complications, Surprise Guests, and Displaced Organs

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Charles finally reads Erik’s mind (and is disturbed), there are...complications...with Alfred that probably only Erik saw coming, and as a result, all sorts of shenanigans ensue. I had so much fun writing this chapter. So, so _very_ much fun.
> 
> Warning: this chapter contains some brief scenes of semi-graphic violence.

Charles did not want to do this. His only possible comfort was the knowledge that Erik didn’t want to, either.

His experiment with Hank had gone quite well. His friend had taken to Marie’s system quite easily -- understandably, considering his science-oriented brain was already used to organizing things. Clarice had had a slightly more difficult time with it at first, but not by much: as she put it, in her future, people who couldn’t compartmentalize didn’t live very long. Logan was Marie’s territory, which only left Erik.

If the situation wasn’t so dire, he’d hope Erik would refuse. He really, truly had no wish to take another trip into that twisted mind -- didn’t want to see what Erik had done after leaving him on that beach, what had happened between then and their ill-advised prison-break at the Pentagon. He’d seen so much ugliness already, especially in Clarice’s mind. While she had not endured the same torments as Marie, her past -- his future -- had held such grief and fear and pain. She had endured, whereas Erik, he was sure, had caused whatever suffering might be found in his mind.

But it had to be done. One weak link could spell disaster for the entire group, and he couldn’t be responsible for making one simply because he was squeamish. 

It was quite late, the others having gone to bed some hours ago. They knew why Erik had gone -- they had to, considering they still all shared a room -- and Charles had no doubt that he’d be in for all manner of interrogation later. Not that he’d be likely to answer any questions.

“Sit down,” Charles said, trying not to sigh. He didn’t need to add, _Let’s get this over with_. It was more or less implied.

Erik sat. He looked even more uncomfortable than Charles felt, if that was even possible. Did he, in fact, have something resembling a conscience? If he didn’t, he wouldn’t care what might be seen in his thoughts and memories. Somehow, the idea that he had one was harder to swallow than the thought of him without one. It was easier to hate him if he was nothing but a monster.

“How does this work?” he asked. “Marie said something about ‘caging’ things within her mind.”

Well, that was a relief. He wasn’t going into this completely ignorant. “That’s exactly what she does. She’s built a prison within her mind, to hold the personalities she absorbs. Did she tell you about them?”

“Briefly. Enough for me to understand that her system works for the thing in the basement.” He paused. “How much of my mind are you going to need to read?”

“I don’t know. For your sake, I hope you aren’t planning anything overly evil.”

“Do you really think so little of me?” Erik asked, genuinely offended.

“You’ve given me little reason to think very _highly_ of you,” Charles retorted. “You want to do what you want to do, and don’t care who you hurt along the way.

“That’s not true,” Erik said, and though his voice was composed, his expression was strained. “Not entirely. If I really didn’t care, I would have killed Trask in France and left you all.”

He had a point, but Charles still didn’t trust him. Erik was an accomplished manipulator. However much he didn’t want to, he was going to have to do a semi-thorough search of Erik’s mind, if he was ever to satisfy himself that he wasn’t going to be betrayed again.

Apparently, Erik realized that himself, because he threw up his hands. “Oh, just read it,” he said, exasperated. “Though I’ll thank you to keep what you find in there to yourself.”

“Unless it poses a genuine danger to someone, I have no reason to tell anyone what I might see.” He was fairly sure already that the only person with true reason to fear Erik was Alfred, but Erik wasn’t stupid. He wouldn’t do anything to the man until they no longer needed him. “When you’re ready.”

“Just get it over with.”

_Erik’s mind was every bit as unpleasant as he’d thought it would be. So much anger, and so much free-floating hatred of the entire world. As Charles had expected, there was no value for human life to be found, with the exception only of Anathea and her group (minus Janek, but even the boy was safe from actual murder)._

_That disdain for humanity would have its own cell, to be separated from his personality if necessary. It needed a rather large cell, because it permeated so very much of his being. If there had been any way of locking it away altogether, Charles would have tried it, ethics be damned, but there wasn’t. Erik would still have access to it._

_The pain of his history was harder to bear. Charles had seen much of it already, but that didn’t make viewing it a second time any easier. It required two cells: one for the child, and one for the young man. Charles had to remind himself that all that pain had created a monster before he could move on._

_There were happier memories as well, from the time before the camps, and those he left alone. Allowing Erik to completely subsume them would be a terrible idea, because it could easily destroy what little conscience he might possess. And they might act as a bastion against the nightmares, far more effectively than they could if they were compartmentalized._

_Raven was another source of pain, and one that made Charles distinctly uncomfortable, given that he still thought of her as a sister. Those were memories he didn’t touch, but shut away un-examined, along with all the thoughts regarding her and Hank. There were some things he just did not need to know._

_Their newer companions, the first group of time travelers...that was interesting. Erik held most of them in a weird dichotomy of disdain and respect. He pitied Marie, but he also feared her -- and rightly so, considering she’d almost killed him with very little effort. Logan he would happily punch, if he thought he could get away with it, but that wariness of Marie kept his temper in check. Ororo’s wisdom he found irritating, yet at the same time he couldn’t ignore it. His feelings toward Clarice were far less charitable than Kitty’s were: left to his own devices, he probably would have legitimately hurt the girl._

_And then there was Kitty herself. As Charles had already briefly seen, the woman aggravated him immensely, but he was also oddly fond of her -- and shockingly, irrationally jealous of anyone he saw as a threat to the strange friendship they had. He’d be downright possessive if he thought anyone would let him get away with it, because she was still the only one who treated him as his own person, rather than the shadow of a man he had not yet become. A man he had no intention of becoming, based on all the group had said of his future self. That bizarre fondness was a useful thing, for now, but the sheer depth of it was a little...worrying. It ran much deeper than Erik even realized, and could easily blow up in everyone’s faces. That would have to be dealt with later, and Charles did not want to be the one to do it._

_How strange it was, though. Erik’s determination to advance his cause had been quite derailed by all he’d heard of that future Magneto, the name they all wielded like a curse. But then, while Erik might be a stubborn man, no one could call him stupid. Faced with such unavoidable evidence of where his course would lead, it was only natural he would change it. The real question was whether or not he could follow through on his intentions, if he could truly break habits he’d had for most of his adult life._

_What he was to do after France was in total flux. At the moment, he was ignoring the thought entirely, because he had no idea what to do next. He didn’t dare follow his instincts, but neither did he wish to stay in a place where he perceived himself as so emphatically unwelcome._

_Those uncertainties also received their own cell, to be tucked away and taken out only after the crisis was over. The less time he had to dwell on them, the better._

_But the strangest thing, what Charles had the most difficulty reconciling, was what Erik thought of_ him. _The derision for what Erik still thought of has his naivete was only expected, but there was a strange, almost grudging form of admiration there as well. Charles had succeeded where he hadn’t: he’d drawn others to himself, people who both honored and trusted him. He was respected, not feared, and needed no demonstration of his power to win loyalty._

 _And beneath it -- very, very far beneath it -- was guilt that lingered even now. Though Erik didn’t let himself think of it, he’d never forgiven himself for inadvertently paralyzing Charles. While there was much they disagreed on, there was little Erik wouldn’t give to undo that mistake. He did not share Charles’s borderline hatred, a fact which rocked Charles to the core. Just what the hell was he meant to do with_ that? __

_Put it away, for now, and reflect on it when he was alone. He had to leave the cell doors accessible, but he prayed Erik would leave them be -- would be content to have only his better memories free to roam. If nothing else, adjusting to this new system would take some getting used to, enough to distract him from planning anything...unpleasant. They could deal with what would come after France once they’d survived it._

When he came back to himself, he found Erik staring at nothing. “It’s done with,” he said, his voice as steady as he could make it. “It will take some adjustment, but the others have acclimated well. You should be fine by tomorrow evening.”

Erik blinked, his eyes focusing. “Thank you, Charles.” It was all he said before he rose and left, his gait slightly uneven. Perhaps he would sleep tonight, but Charles knew that he himself would not.

\--

If asked, Erik could not possibly have described his current state. He felt drunk, but his senses remained far sharper than normal intoxication would allow.

He didn’t know just what Charles had done, when he set up the ‘cells’. Oh, he’d felt things moving around in his mind, and it was possibly the oddest sensation he’d ever experienced, but the details, the things Charles might or might not have seen, were an unknown. He clearly hadn’t found anything overly terrible, or he would never have let Erik leave.

Sleep was out of the question. He made his way to the kitchen, and spent an interminable amount of time staring at the refrigerator without opening the door. He wasn’t hungry, nor was he thirsty; maybe it was fresh air he needed, to restore some sort of equilibrium to his mind.

This late at night -- or rather, this early in the morning -- the air had finally cooled, though it was a long way from chilly. The concrete patio beneath his feet bare feet was damp with dew, and he paused to appreciate the feel of it. Somehow, it was downright wonderful. He crossed the lawn, only coming to a stop when reached the stone fence.

At this hour, he hadn’t expected anyone else to be moving about. _Awake,_ yes, since there was no guarantee the nightmares would be dispelled entirely, but he heard faint footsteps on the walkway off the porch. The figure they belonged to was so small it could only be Kitty, and she was headed, despite the fact that she had no flashlight, for the bunker. Just what the hell was she doing?

She completely ignored him when he called her name, moving with grim, silent purpose. When he tried to grab her shoulder, his hand phased right through -- and dear God, _that_ was a sensation so wrong he hoped he’d never experience it again. He’d thought passing through walls was bad, but that... _eurgh_.

“Kitty, _what_ are you doing?” he demanded, snapping his fingers in front of her face in an attempt at breaking her strange, intense concentration. He wasn’t terribly surprised when she didn’t answer, but he was quite unnerved. It was obvious that he had no way of physically restraining her, and it would take far too long to grab Charles to handle her mind. Was she sleepwalking? He’d heard that sleepwalkers were sometimes difficult to wake.

“Wake _up,_ ” he ordered, his unease growing. “I’ll put spiders in your shoes if you don’t. I’ll order tarantulas from the pet store and leave them all over your room.” Again he snapped his fingers, and again he received no response at all. “I’ll let one lay eggs in your ear. You’ll have baby spiders all over your face.”

Still nothing. Her feet phased right through an abandoned wheelbarrow, still headed, slow but inexorable, toward the bunker. 

“ _Wake up!_ ” he said again, this time almost shouting right into her ear. That did earn a response, of a sort -- she paused long enough to slap him. Hard.

Erik winced, and touched his cheek. For such a tiny creature, she hit with the strength of a goddamn sailor. Wonderful. He couldn’t stop her, but she could attack him if she chose. This night just kept getting better and better.

When she finally reached the bunker, he reached for her shoulder, hoping that even if his hand phased through her, he could still bypass the wall along with her. Fortunately -- at least, he hoped it was fortunate -- it worked.

The lights were dimmed slightly, but still bright enough to allow him to see her face. What he saw chilled him: her expression was almost entirely blank, eyes wide and unseeing, strands of hair stuck to her sweat-beaded forehead. This might look like Kitty, but it most definitely wasn’t. The lights were on, but she was not the one at home.

Alfred’s head snapped up at her approach. He was sitting on the floor, a few more empty wrappers and water-bottles beside him, and there was...something...in his hands. It was a lump of black plastic, a number of wires sticking out like legs on a millipede. Where he had got either, Erik had no idea, but finding out was crucial.

The bastard’s eyes widened, his pale face draining of what little color it had to lose. Erik might not have a clue just what was going on with Kitty, but it would seem Alfred did, because he looked two seconds away from a coronary. He stood, staring at her like a mouse transfixed by a snake, mouth working but throat producing no sound. For a moment, unsettled though he was, Erik took a certain amount of vicious satisfaction in his terror --

\-- that abruptly turned into horror when Kitty’s hand shot out, reached right into Alfred’s chest, and _pulled._

Surprisingly, the man himself didn’t scream, but _Erik_ did -- a short, aborted noise that turned into a string of cursing that would have done Logan proud. Alfred’s heart rested in Kitty’s small hand, dripping gore -- and still beating.

Erik couldn’t help it. He recoiled. What he saw in Kitty’s face was easily the most terrifying thing he had ever seen in his life: her eyes were fixed on the pulsing thing, staring at it like it held all the answers to the mysteries of the universe, even as Alfred staggered. Incredibly, the wound in hist chest wasn’t bleeding at all -- because, as Erik’s eyes somehow managed to communicate to his brain, there _was_ no wound. Where there should have been a gaping hole, there was only pale, unnaturally smooth skin. Just what in the name of all hell had happened? What the hell was _still_ happening?

Kitty blinked, and he could spot the exact moment that everything that made her _Kitty_ came flooding back. Her eyes widened in unadulterated horror, and she flung the bloody organ as if it were one o the spiders from the house in France.

Acting on pure instinct, Erik darted forward to catch it -- and almost immediately dropped it himself, because holy _God_ did that feel _wrong._ It was tough and leathery and still warm, the blood leaving it disgustingly slippery in his hand.

“What the fuck?!” Kitty screamed, staring at her blood-smeared fingers. She’d gone nearly as pale as Alfred, though at least she didn’t look like she was about to lose consciousness. “What the actual fuck -- how did I get -- what the hell did I just _do?!_ ”

“I would think that would be fairly obvious,” Erik said, hardly aware of what left his mouth. “It’s still beating -- can you...put it back?”

“Put it back?!” she said, a somewhat ominous note of hysteria in her voice. “It has veins and tubes and shit. I can’t just shove it back in there and hope they reconnect!” She was hyperventilating, totally ignoring Alfred, who was staring at his chest in complete incomprehension.

“Well, you can _try_. Take it,” he said, shoving the disgusting thing back into her hand. “Do whatever it is you do and let’s get out of here.” He didn’t even want to think about what Charles would do, if he discovered this little...outing. 

“Oh, Christ,” Kitty moaned, shutting her eyes, as though by doing so she could make the entire situation go away. “Why the hell did I do this? I don’t even know how I fucking go out here!”

“You walked,” Erik said, dry even through his own mounting panic. “I tried to stop you, but you wouldn’t wake up, and you aren’t exactly easy to grab.”

Kitty grimaced, approaching Alfred as though he were something slimy and rotten. “Brilliant,” she muttered, her breathing still far too fast. “Fucking brilliant. Um, hold still, will you?” she said to Alfred, who appeared to have gone halfway comatose even while still standing. Incredibly, he was actually _breathing_ , chest rising and falling faintly.

She pressed the heart right where it belonged, and Erik, who had seen many, many disgusting things in his life (hell, he’d been responsible for more than a few) had to look away. He wondered if there would be a squish.

“Um. Erik, I think we have a problem.” Kitty’s voice sounded rather less panicked, mostly because it was now filled with disbelief.

“ _A_ problem?” he said, looking back at her. She’d pressed the heart against Alfred’s chest, but it just...sat there in her hand, still beating. “Just...stick it back in.”

“I _can’t_ ,” she said, staring. “My hand won’t phase.”

“Is that even possible?” he demanded, though he felt his own heart sinking. Oh God, there was absolutely no way this could possibly end well. At all.

“It shouldn’t be. I mean, I’ve never found anything I couldn’t pass through -- and I pulled the damn thing _out_ , didn’t I?” She looked at him, terror rising in her eyes again. “What are we going to do with it? Do we just...hide it, and hope nobody notices? He’s still sort of alive -- maybe we can just...keep it hidden, until we have to go to France?” 

She pulled her hand away and set the heart on a box of oatmeal, wiping her fingers on her shirt with a shudder. “Except Logan would totally notice. Shit. Shit shit _shit_ , can’t you think of something?”

“This is just a _shade_ outside my experience,” he snapped, unable to take his eyes off the throbbing thing. “What could have possessed you to do this?”

“It wasn’t Tara,” Kitty said, shuddering. That wasn’t what he’d meant at all, but it was a good point. “I know that. But what else -- goddammit, I don’t believe in possession. It’s bullshit. That’s jumping out of the supernatural and into straight-up magic.”

“So is ripping out someone’s heart and not being able to put it back,” Erik pointed out. “I think we need to suspend the idea of anything being impossible, for now.” He sighed, looking for any spare paper. “I think we need to take it with us --”

He didn’t get to finish the sentence. Something large, heavy, and Alfred-shaped plowed into him like a rogue rugby player, sending the heart flying and nearly knocking him off his feet. The man’s face was filled with a dumb, animal sort of purpose, eyes vacant but nevertheless somehow holding Erik’s like some horrible type of hypnosis as his hands fastened around Erik’s throat. Erik punched him, but only received a fistful of teeth for his trouble.

Kitty jumped on Alfred’s back, braining him with his plastic-and-wire creation, but it barely broke his concentration. She had to hit him three more times before his grip eased, leaving Erik to stagger backward, coughing, his throat on raw fire and vision slightly blurred from oxygen deprivation.

Kitty let go, rolling aside as Alfred tried to grab her. She caught hold of his ankle and pushed, sending his foot right through the concrete floor and leaving it there.

He roared, flailing, still reaching for her, and she scrambled away, left hand pressed to her ribs. “Fucking _hell_ , who turned him into a zombie?” she demanded, hauling herself to her feet.

“A what?” Erik said, or tried to -- all his abused throat could produce was a croak.

She looked at him, wincing as she rubbed her side. “Really? _Night of the Living Dead_ came out in 1968.”

“I was in _prison_ ,” he pointed out, still coughing. “What the hell is a zombie?”

Kitty limped over to him, carefully staying out of Alfred’s reach. “It’s...a living dead thing. Not actually alive, but still moving. And pissed. And usually hungry. Shit, did he bite you?” she asked, her eyes widening when she saw his right hand. The heart had been in his left, but the knuckles of his right were scraped and bloody from their contact with Alfred’s teeth. “Oh, motherfucker, he did. We have to go to the Professor, because I have no idea how to fix this.”

“And he will?” Erik asked, witheringly. The whole thin sounded totally ridiculous, but no more so than anything else that had happened in the last fifteen minutes.

“He’d be better at it than me,” she said. “What a clusterfuck. Come on.” She grabbed the heart in one hand, Erik’s left hand in the other, and dragged him back out through the wall.

The calm of the night air was such a contrast to his pounding heart that for a second, dizziness enveloped him. Dark stars danced across his vision, and he swayed on his feet.

“Shit, it’s already starting. Okay. Um. Move slowly and try to keep your heart rate down, okay?” Kitty was staring up at him, so anxious she was practically vibrating with it. “I do not want to have to shoot you in the head.”

He wasn’t going to ask. He really, really didn’t want to know. Especially since he was fairly certain Kitty’s zombie theory was nothing but bullshit -- Alfred clearly wasn’t dead, as he was still breathing, and his heart was even now beating in Kitty’s hand. The sight was more than a little nauseating, and he shook his head, utterly ignoring her advice and striding for the kitchen.

“Dude, I mean it! If you move too fast, the virus will just hit your brain even sooner,” she protested, trying to block his path. She held out the heart like she expected it to ward him off -- and for a few moments, she wasn’t wrong. He had to fight not to recoil, and just barely won.

“We really don’t have time for this,” he said, lifting her off her feet and trying to ignore her wince. “That heart has to go somewhere, before somebody else finds it.”

“Put me down!” she demanded, scowling through her pain. “I’ll rub this thing on your face if you don’t.” 

“Is that supposed to help slow the zombiefication process?” he asked, ignoring her threat, despite the fact that he was quite certain she’d follow up on it. Sure enough, she did just that, pressing the disgusting thing against his cheek -- the same one she’d slapped earlier, which just made the whole experience _so_ much better.

“How do you not know what a zombie is, but you know a word like ‘zombiefication’?” she asked, obviously disappointed that he hadn’t just dropped her. What she didn’t know was that he was coming closer and closer to doing precisely that: each time the damn thing pulsed against his cheek, nausea flared in his stomach.

He almost groaned when he saw that the lights in the kitchen were on. Detouring to the back door was not a pleasant idea, but he didn’t get the chance: Clarice stepped out the French doors, took one look at him, and screamed bloody murder. She fled back into the house before he could say anything.

“Wonderful,” he sighed. “Will you get that thing off my face?”

“Will you put me down?” Kitty countered.

“No.”

“Then sorry, you’re stuck with it.”

“What in mother _fuck_ is goin’ on out here?” Oh, brilliant. Logan was awake as well. He burst out the door, Marie, Ororo, Hank, and Raven all crowding behind him. Of course they all just had to pick tonight to have insomnia.

“Alfred turned into a zombie and bit Erik,” Kitty said, before he could get a word in edgewise.

“A _zombie?_ ” Marie demanded, even as Logan said, “Since when is he _Erik_?”

“He’s not a zombie, and the only reason he looks like one is because you _ripped his heart out_ ,” Erik snapped. “Now I mean it, get it off my face.”

“I didn’t do it on purpose!” Kitty cried. “And I would have put it back if I could.”

Logan shook his head. “Gimme that,” he said, taking Kitty from Erik like she was a sack of potatoes. “Start that from the beginn -- holy _fuck_ , that thing’s still beatin’!”

“I’d noticed,” Erik said, trying to wipe the gunk of his face with the tail of his shirt. “Hence why Alfred is not actually a zombie, and why no one needs to shoot me in the head. Not. A. Word,” he added, glaring at Logan.

“Give it here,” Marie said, holding out her gloved hands. “We can...stick it in a jar, or somethin’, until we know what to do with it. Kitty, what the hell were you thinkin’?”

“I wasn’t,” Kitty said. “I didn’t even know I’d done it until I already had, if that makes any sense. I don’t remember even leaving my room.”

“Because we so needed this complication,” Marie sighed, grimacing when Kitty handed her the thing. “I need a Mason jar or somethin’.”

“I’ll get one,” Clarice said. “Somebody should get the Professor.” She looked quite expectantly at Logan, who rolled his eyes.

“Fine. Take that,” he said, not quite tossing Kitty back at Erik, who almost dropped her.

“Ow! That hurt, fucker. I might just leave that thing under your pillow.”

“Oh, no you don’t,” Marie warned. “You don’t wanna start _that_ war, Kitty.”

“...You’re probably right,” Kitty said, very wisely. “Dude, put me down. Seriously.”

“No.” He wasn’t quite sure why he was so adamant about that, but some instinct compelled him. “If I do, you’ll run off and do something stupid.”

Kitty let out a strangled noise of protest, but Marie snorted. “He’s right. I just...you really couldn’t put it back?”

“Nope,” she said, glowering at Erik. “I tried. Seriously, dude, if you don’t put me down, I _will_ kick you in the head.”

“You’re not exactly flexible enough for that,” Ororo pointed out. She was peering at the heart, her expression both fascinated and repelled, until Hank gently ushered her out of the way. He’d grabbed a Mason jar, and he took the heart from Marie as though he was receiving the Holy Grail.

“And you said he’s still alive?” he asked, watching the thing pulse through the glass.

“Well, sort of. He’s breathing, but right now his foot’s stuck in the floor.” Kitty had apparently resigned herself to being five feet above the ground, because she just heaved an irritated sigh. “Still not convinced he isn’t a zombie, though.”

“He isn’t a damn zombie,” Erik snapped, and barely resisted the urge to roll his eyes when he heard the telltale approach of Charles’s wheelchair. It wasn’t, however, coming from just one direction -- somebody was approaching from the lawn as well.

“Oh, fuckin’ hell,” Marie groaned, pinching the bridge of her nose. Her bloody glove left two red fingerprints, and she twitched, immediately wiping her face with her other hand. “Hi, Professor. I’d say we could explain this, but I’m honestly not so sure about that.”

Their visitors were two very elderly men -- one on foot, one in a wheelchair, and Erik had a stark, unfortunate suspicion he knew who they were. “It’s fairly easy to explain,” he said. “We have a disembodied heart that’s still beating.”

The two men shared a look that was somehow incredulous, weirdly amused, and profoundly disturbed all at once. But then, if they were indeed himself and Charles from the future, that was probably only to be expected.

“He got bit by a zombie,” Kitty said, jabbing a thumb in his face. “Does that mean older-him won’t exist anymore?”

“For the last time, he wasn’t a zombie,” Erik said. “And that heart is only a problem because, again, _you ripped it out._ ”

“I know,” she groused, rolling her eyes. “I was _there_ , remember? Are you really going to put it that way to the other Professor?”

“Put what what way?” Charles the Younger chose -- of course -- that moment to enter the kitchen. He took one look around, and heaved a sigh that suggested he carried the weight of the entire universe. Rather than comment, he said, “Since when did we get visitors?”

“Charles,” the man in the wheelchair said, warmly. “I see you found us, Logan.”

Logan’s eyes widened. “ _Professor?_ How the hell long have you been here?”

“Well, it’s a long story. Though not, I think, as long as yours.”

“You have _no idea_ ,” Marie said emphatically. She looked at Logan. “Sugar, I’m pretty sure we could all use a drink. Can you pick out whatever’s got the highest proof?”

“Darlin’,” Logan said, his eyes sweeping the room, “it would be my goddamn pleasure.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Muahahaha. Oh, complications, how I love thee. Alfred the (Not Quite) Undead Terrorist, mysterious possessions, and now another Charles and Magneto? Logan’s worst fear come true.


	26. One Chants Out Between Two Worlds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Young Charles is severely weirded out by his older self, the entity that drove Kitty to rip out Alfred’s heart is revealed, and the whole group discovers that they are not the only people (or the only world) to have a beef with the Memories.

The jar with the heart sat in the middle of the table, like some sort of obscene conversation piece.

Marie wasn’t quite sure whose idea it was to put it there, but now it seemed like nobody wanted to admit they were squeamish enough to want it gone. She herself had drunk enough vodka that she no longer cared.

As usual, she sat with Logan on one side and nobody else on the other, trusting him to keep her from accidentally bumping into someone and murdering them with her face. She was leaning against him now, head on his shoulder, resolutely refusing to explain...anything. That task fell to Ororo, who laid out the last five days to the Professor and Magneto. 

It took over an hour, two bottles of vodka, a pizza, and a great deal of interruptions, but eventually they got through it all. The whole of it, actually put into words, sounded so insane that Marie barely believed it, and she’d _been_ there.

“A week,” the Professor -- the older Professor, oh God, she was going to have to come up with something else to call the younger one -- said. “You’ve all been back here less than a week, and look how you’ve changed everything.” He sounded more amused than anything else. 

“And not even on purpose,” Ororo said, with a small smile. “Mostly, anyway.”

“That would require an amount of forethought I think none of you are capable of,” the younger Magneto -- shit, she was going to have to start calling this one Erik, wasn’t she? -- muttered. He winced a little, as Kitty very obviously kicked him under the table.

“Because you’ve done so much better,” she said, giving him what Marie could only describe as a hairy eyeball.

He raised an eyebrow. “I’m sorry, but of the two of us, who accidentally ripped a man’s heart out of his chest?”

“That was _one time!_ ” she protested. “Although if you keep it up, I might just give a repeat performance. Or finish ‘Go the Fuck to Sleep’.”

“Children,” Ororo said, earning a glare from both of them. “Not helping. Anyway, that’s our story. How long have you two been back here?”

They exchanged a somewhat unfathomable glance. “Less than a day. The three of you vanished without a warning, and not ten minutes later, we found ourselves on the side of a freeway. We nearly got arrested for hitchhiking.”

_That_ was a sight Marie would have paid to see. Especially since she couldn’t imagine Magneto not throwing some kind of tantrum over it. (Hey, she might know that he’d been working with the Professor, but she hadn’t actually seen it, and she was never going to like the bastard. Attempted murder, and all.)

“So you were pulled back ten minutes after us, but arrived almost a week later?” Clarice said. “I’d say we should ask _Alfred_ more about time travel, but even if he had his heart, I doubt we could force it out of him.”

“One of the Professors could check his mind,” Logan said. “Sorry, but one of you is Charles. You hash that one out between you. Would it even be possible to read his mind while he’s a zombie?”

“Not a zombie,” Erik muttered, though Marie suspected that by this point, it was an assertion made on auto-pilot.

The elder Professor was quiet a moment. “I don’t see how it could hurt. Kitty, you say he’s...restrained?”

“We’ll go ahead and call it that, yeah,” she said. “He can’t get anywhere near you, if I take you in there.”

“Why can’t you just read it from here?” Magneto asked. Unlike the Professor, he looked very, very tired. Marie refused to feel sorry for him, though, because again, asshole who tried to kill her. She was still trying to reconcile herself to the idea of _younger_ him; dealing with the Magneto she’d known just wasn’t an option yet.

“Lead,” the Professors chorused. Okay, if that kept up, it was going to get really, really weird in a hurry.

“I can get you in,” Kitty said, “but you might want to take Logan, just in case _Alfred_ somehow got his foot out of the floor. I’d say that was impossible, but he’s somehow alive without his heart, so...yeah.”

_That_ thought was somewhat alarming, despite the fact that Marie knew he was more than capable of taking care of himself. It was the zombie aspect that freaked her out -- no matter what Magneto (Erik, _goddammit_ ) said, a guy who lurched around with no heart and bit people sounded a hell of a lot like a zombie to her.

“Not a problem,” Logan said, “but I’m thinkin’ we should wait until mornin’. Far as I’m concerned, three a.m. doesn’t count as ‘mornin’.”

“You’ve got that right,” Clarice muttered. 

“It might be a good idea,” the Professor -- their Professor -- said. Marie was going to have to start thinking of the younger one as ‘Charles’, or this was never going to work. “This would be much better attempted with clear heads.”

_Meaning_ , Marie thought, _not completely punchy from lack of sleep_. She had to agree there.

“You want we should fix up some rooms?” Logan said. “Thanks to the nightmares, rest’ve us have been stayin’ in one room with our ‘watchers’. East wing still stinks like garlic, though,” he added, giving Kitty a glare. Her answering look was completely unrepentant. 

“Worth it,” she said, looking at Clarice, who somehow managed to both wince and scowl.

The Professor and Magneto shared a glance that almost made Marie burst out laughing. They were both in for a fair amount of...well, she supposed ‘culture shock’ was the closest term she could come up with. This might be the past, but it was no longer history as _they_ knew it. Such a sharp deviation from their original timeline was probably not something either would get used to overnight. Then again, it wasn’t like the rest of them had, either, and they’d lived it.

“We’d appreciate it,” Magneto said. “Today has been...tiring...in a way nothing in the war ever managed.”

“You’d better get used to that,” Ororo said, a little grimly. “There’s rarely a dull moment around here. We go through a lot of coffee.”

“And booze,” Marie said. “And food. Really, we just go through a lot of everythin’. And we never did get back to the store again, sugar,” she said to Logan.

“We’re pickin’ some other victims tomorrow,” he said. “I’m not goin’ through that again any time soon.”

Again she almost laughed, this time because her entire group collectively tensed. Clarice actually twitched.

“We all need to go get more clothes, too,” Marie said, feeling more than a little evil, “before we head to France. We can only wash everythin’ we’ve got so many times before it falls apart.”

Now it was Kitty who twitched. Rather like Marie herself, she’d never been particularly interested in shopping, but Clarice had loved clothes, once upon a time, and she couldn’t leave the house until they got her some hair dye and makeup -- which meant Kitty and Marie would be doing her shopping for her. _If I have to suffer,_ Marie thought, _so do you._

“Not with those ribs, you’re not,” Hank said firmly. “You were supposed to be on bed rest the last three days, not turning people into zombies.”

“Not a zombie,” Erik said, yet again, eyeing his scraped knuckles.

“You _sure_ we can’t shoot him in the head?” Logan muttered. He jumped when a fork clipped him in the ear.

“ _Children_ ,” Ororo sighed. “Professor, Magneto, I’ll help you find some rooms. The rest of you, behave yourselves.”

“Not sure that’s possible, with this group,” Hank said, mostly to himself. Marie had to resist an extremely childish urge to stick her tongue out at him, mostly because that would just prove him right.

“You need to sleep?” Logan asked her quietly, and she knew what he meant: did she want to stay in the main room again, or find their own? As much as she’d like the latter, she was dog-tired.

“I do,” she said. “And I’m probably not the only one. Think the only reason everybody’s still up is ’cause the Professor -- gonna have to start callin’ one of ’em Charles, too -- went in and stuck my system in their heads. Probably still tryin’ to get used to it.”

“They’d better do it quick, before we head to France,” he said, low. When she stood, he followed after her, closer than he perhaps needed to.

Marie shivered. “Part of me’s terrified to go, and another part just wants to get it over with. Professor -- Charles -- is probably gonna want us to go in the next couple days, huh?”

“Probably,” Logan agreed. “We’ll get through it, darlin’. This group might be a bunch of lunatics, but we’re _tough_ lunatics. The rest can get figured out later.”

While that was probably a terrible idea, it was nevertheless tempting. Right now, she didn’t want to think about a damn thing besides some kittens and a soft pillow. Wait.

“What about the kittens?” she asked. “We can’t leave ’em here on their own, but none of us can stay. ’Cause you _know_ the Professor and older Magneto won’t be willin’ to sit this out, even if they’re not directly involved.”

Logan groaned. “Let’s worry about those damn furballs later. If we have to, we’ll stuff ’em in that crate and put it in the cockpit with Hank. He’ll just _love_ that.”

The mental image made Marie giggle so hard she almost couldn’t walk straight. Especially since she knew they’d be meowing up a storm the entire time.

They reached the room before everyone else, and were therefor mobbed by attention-starved kittens. Marie dealt with them while Logan grumbled, trying to wipe the cat hair off his pillow. She bit the inside of her cheek, somehow managing not to laugh. The little ginger tried to climb his leg, meowing all the while, and he glared down at it.

“Marie, do me a favor and grab this thing, will you?” he asked, sounding very pained.

She rolled her eyes. “C’mere, you,” she said, disentangling its claws from the fabric of Logan’s jeans. Immediately it became a perfect sphere of fluff, nuzzling against her hand and purring like a tiny orange chainsaw.

Logan grumbled again, but didn’t protest when she took the little creature with her as she laid down. He wrapped his arm around her waist, careful not to squish the kitten, and she could feel him listening to her breathing until she fell asleep.

\--

Charles had known that he and Erik had future selves, but he only now realized he hadn’t properly comprehended what that meant until faced with them.

Strangely, the thing that struck him most was that apparently, at some point, he lost all his hair. The fact that his older self was somehow far more well-adjusted, despite having lived the last few years in a hellish future, took longer to sink in. When it did, he felt hopelessly inadequate -- a ridiculous thought, considering the other man was him, and had once been where he was now.

Well, not quite. The last week was his and his alone, which was somehow an even odder thought -- though not half so much as the way older him interacted with older Erik. Kitty and Logan were, evidently, telling the truth: somehow, in spite of everything, they really had reconciled. It was not the teeth-clenched teamwork he’d been expecting, either; they truly did appear to be friends once more. 

And that...well, coupled with what he’d seen in younger Erik’s mind, it troubled him. One of the current foundations of his psyche was shifting, and he didn’t like it. At all. It was so much easier to think of Erik as a monster and nothing more.

The man in question had beaten him to the communal bedroom, where he was currently lying down and trying to keep a kitten from crawling on his face. Kitty was actually trying to help him, but the little furry creature would not be deterred.

Eventually, she picked it up, held it in front her own face, and said, very solemnly, “Go the fuck to sleep.”

Logan snorted -- very quietly, so as not to wake Marie. Ororo smothered a laugh in her hand, and Hank choked a little.

The kitten, apparently unimpressed, leaned forward in her grasp and bit the tip of her nose. Now it was _Erik_ who tried not to laugh -- tried, and failed.

Charles wondered if he should talk to the older Erik, if there was any point in discovering what sort of hell the man had unleashed. Whatever he’d done, he had to regret it now, or Charles was certain his older self would never have fully reconciled with him. With any luck, Erik the Elder could talk his own younger self out of any potential...stupidity...he might plan after France. It was true that young Erik had no current plans to, but that could always change.

Charles looked around the room, at all the strange, maddening (and occasionally mad) people who had wormed their way into his life so effectively. He had to get them all out of France alive, or he would never, ever forgive himself. He wasn’t certain his older self would, either.

\--

_Eventually, Kitty slept. As soon as she’d nodded off, the Stranger stirred, deep within her mind._

_The heart was not enough, it knew. There were far more organs to gather, living things that must be used._

_She wasn’t an easy creature to possess, but she was the only one who was capable of doing what the Stranger wished. It needed the organs, but it also needed their owners alive. Fighting the darkness with death would have no impact: only the living would do._

_None of the living yet knew it, but they were not the only ones who would see the Memories destroyed. Such creatures didn’t belong in this world, and could not be allowed to escape their basement prison. Powerful as they were, those who now stood against them simply would not be enough._

_Yes, it needed more organs, but it couldn’t take them until everyone else fell asleep, until no one would be aware of Kitty’s movements. Influencing others while still in her mind was not easy, and it took precious time they did not have to spare. The telepath was difficult, but Erik, however convincingly he pretended, was impossible. But then, he would be -- he alone had seen what the Stranger did. Kitty herself had no memory of it, and never would, but the Other had no way of making him forget._

_Eventually, it had no choice. If it were to wait for him to truly sleep, the others might well be awake -- the Stranger could only hold them all for a finite amount of time. He had no way of waking or stopping her, even if he followed, so let him._

_It stood, careful not to step on anyone or anything. Having a physical form was...hard. It had not operated a physical being in a very, very long time, and had to consciously think about putting one foot in front of the other. Fortunately, Kitty could phase through walls and doors without thought, and she did so now._

_The glow of the waning moon shone through the windows, but the Stranger needed no light to see. It knew where the others slept, too, and guided her silently through the corridors. They had little time: Erik would follow, and if he had any sense, he would wake the others. So much distraction might allow Kitty to break free again, and the only recourse the Stranger would have was rather less merciful. It took no joy in killing the living, but neither did it grieve for them. It did what it must, and nothing more._

\--

Erik swore silently. He’d known this would happen -- he’d _known_ it. He also knew that, much though he didn’t want to, he had to wake the others for this. Given how spectacularly he’d failed on his own the first time, he didn’t want to try snapping Kitty out of...whatever the hell she was in...alone.

“Get up,” he said, more harshly even than he’d intended. “We have a problem.”

It was probably the level of his voice that roused them at first, but once his words sunk in, half of them tensed. He flicked the lights up to full brightness, dislodging a kitten from his knee.

“Kitty?” Charles asked, rubbing his face.

“She’s moving again,” Erik confirmed. “Or something’s moving her. She might be after another...victim.”

Logan cursed, but not so loudly or creatively as Marie, who shoved her tangled hair out of her face. “Who the hell is she after now?”

“Obviously not one of us,” Hank said, trying to put his glasses on straight. “Either she’s gone to finish off the job with Alfred, or she’s headed for his group.”

Much as Erik would love to let her rip out one of Janek’s organs, the rest of them weren’t bad people, and she’d never forgive any of them if they didn’t at least try to stop her. 

Charles’s expression went blank for a moment, his eyes unfocusing. “She’s on her way to their wing,” he said. “Or, rather, whatever’s driving her is on its way. Erik, I’ve asked our future selves to intercept her, but I don’t know if they can.”

“Probably not,” Marie said, stuffing her feet into slippers. “She’s not exactly easy to catch. I don’t think there’s anythin’ she can’t just phase through. Except Alfred’s chest, apparently.”

Erik tried not to shudder. Somehow, her attempt to put the heart back was almost worse than its removal.

They moved in a herd through the corridors, with a great deal of both tripping and cursing and a total absence of stealth. Erik’s hand throbbed, and he found himself hoping that she wasn’t right about the zombie thing after all. While he didn’t know just what the bite might do, the fact that she’d said someone would need to shoot him in the head was...not encouraging.

\--

_They’d woken._ All _of them, past and future. Both telepaths were hunting, trying to find Kitty’s mind where it sat safely cocooned within the Stranger’s grasp. Trying to fight the pair of them was far from easy, and it could feel Kitty’s consciousness stirring._

Who are you?

_It was the elder telepath, the one from the future. He was the stronger of the two, and much more adept._ You need not know, _the Stranger said_. You need only let me work. You cannot defeat the Memories without my help.

We can’t let you hurt the others, _he countered._ What you’ve done is wrong, as is using Kitty to do it. We don’t need to kill our own people.

You know nothing, _the Stranger said_. And they are not your people, nor am I killing them. You cannot do this without me.

We woke the Memories, _the other telepath said._ We can destroy them. You aren’t the first being to visit our dreams.

I do not visit, _the Stranger snapped_. What you have seen nothing more than shades, peering through the veil to give you advice of little use. I offer you tangible aid, and you refuse.

_Kitty twitched, and for a moment the Stranger’s feet faltered. It forced her onward, but she twitched again, struggling to wake, making the Stranger almost lose its footing. Not for the first time did it curse being trapped in a physical form._

_Sleep, it ordered, but she refused. Her attempts were sluggish, but they were undeniable: she was fighting, and the Stranger had no time for it. It tamped down on her consciousness, ruthless, driving her forward._

_The others -- the entire lot of them -- came skidding into the hallway from around a corner. A human might have found the sight of them comical; to the Stranger, they were just an annoyance, and one easily dealt with._

\--

Logan wasn’t going to lie: he’d seen a lot of freaky things in his life, but the Kitty that approached them scared the living shit out of him. Her face was almost vacant, but not entirely: there was purpose in her eyes, more alien even than what he’d seen of the Memories. She even _smelled_ wrong: harsh and metallic, like an oncoming thunderstorm. Marie was right -- there wasn’t actually any way to restrain her.

“You broke free of this once,” young Magneto said, his tone a strange mix of worry, fear, and total exasperation. “You can do it again, preferably _without_ tearing out someone’s organs. Otherwise, I’m putting this on your face.” He held up his uninjured hand, showing her -- where the fuck had he found that spider? Logan hoped like hell the thing hadn’t been crawling around the bedroom while they were all asleep. Spiders didn’t really bug him, but he didn’t like the thought of one trying to get into his ear while he slept.

Kitty blinked, and for a fraction of a second, Logan would swear he saw _her_ in her eyes. It was so brief that he might have imagined it; even if he hadn’t, it certainly hadn’t slowed her down. 

She did pause, however, when she reached them, those ungodly eyes sweeping over the entire group. Logan actually felt his skin crawl. “You’ll all die without my help,” she said, “but if you stand in my way, I’ll kill you myself. I will not let you hinder me.”

Logan never would understand how every single one of them managed to stand fast. Their collective terror was so intense that the stench of it was absolutely foul, but they all stayed put.

The Kitty-thing’s eyes swept them all again, expressionless. Save for that, she stood unnaturally still, free of any tension -- which made what she did next such a shock. Her right hand shot out, landing right over Magneto’s heart -- and staying there, immobile.

She actually blinked, whatever was in her mind temporarily thrown. It tried again, with the same lack of result, and Logan could see its hold crack.

“She doesn’t want to kill him.” The Professor -- the older Professor -- wheeled himself down the hallway, somehow looking serene as ever. “You can’t truly force her to do anything, you know. You can’t make her kill where she doesn’t wish to. I would imagine it only worked with Alfred because she already wanted him dead.”

“I do not kill,” thing said, sounding almost humanly puzzled. “Those I take from do not die. Why would she stop me?”

“He’s a jackass, sure, but she’s never actually wanted to _hurt_ him,” Logan said. “Just throw shit at him. Including spiders, which, yeah, you might want to make use of that, bub. Might help.”

Magneto blinked, rousing himself out of his stupor. He looked at the spider in his hand as though he’d entirely forgotten it. Fortunately, he did as bidden, and dropped the thing on Kitty’s outstretched arm.

She jerked backward, trying to fling the thing away, and yeah, _there_ was Kitty. Logan doubted the thing in her head was afraid of spiders.

“Christ!” she yelped, flicking it away with her left hand. Her flailing would have been funny, if the situation hadn’t been so tense.

“Is it gone?” he asked, inhaling even as he spoke. She smelled like Kitty again, albeit a Kitty drenched in fear.

“What, the thing in my head, or the spider?” she asked, a little hysterically.

“Both. You smell like you again -- _are_ you you?”

Kitty shuddered, rubbing her arms. “Think so. Am I going to have to worry about that every time I go to sleep?”

“Not if I do for you what I did for the others,” Charles said, with a firmness Logan wasn’t sure he actually felt. “You can keep it out like they do the Memories.”

Logan inhaled again, unease creeping through him once more. Kitty might smell like herself again, but the weird, metallic scent wasn’t actually gone.

He didn’t realize what was happening until it was too late, and apparently nobody else did, either. Marie stepped forward, stripping off one glove, her expression dreamy and vacant. Before anyone could react, she grabbed Kitty by the throat.

\--

_Oh, great,_ Kitty thought, right before searing pain hit her like a truck. Rogue had never touched her before, but holy _shit_ did it hurt like a bitch. It only took a few seconds for her brain to catch up and let her phase through Rogue’s hand, but those few seconds were more than enough.

She landed on her knees ( _ow_ ), choking like a clubbed seal, and thinking, vaguely, that passing out right now sounded like an absolutely fantastic idea. Unfortunately, consciousness didn’t seem to want to cooperate. Dammit.

Somebody -- Erik, she realized, when her eyes bothered to focus -- picked her up, checking her throat. It sure as hell felt like it ought to be bruised, but she was pretty sure that wasn’t how Rogue’s power worked. He had a pretty amazing ring of bruises around his own neck, thanks to zombie Alfred. The sheer fury in his face was a rather terrifying thing -- or would have been, if she hadn’t felt so goddamn awful.

“So,” she managed, clearing her throat, “ _that_ just happened. Please tell me Rogue isn’t possessed.”

“Rogue’s possessed,” Clarice said, her voice laced with panic.

“Dammit.” She looked back at Erik. “Are we going to have to have the ‘put me down’ argument again?”

“I wasn’t aware there was any argument to be had,” he snapped. The way he was glaring at Rogue was...not good.

“Don’t,” she said quietly, touching his face to make him actually look at her. “Let the Professor handle it. Next to him, Rogue’s probably got the strongest mind in the entire damn world. If anybody can lock that thing up, it’s her. Just chill.” She paused. “Can I get a rough estimate on when you _will_ put me down?”

He gave her a look that wasn’t quite a glare. “No.” 

She _could_ always just phase herself back to the floor, but...she didn’t want to. And she was absolutely not going to think about why. Nope.

\--

It had been so long since Charles had seen Marie. So very, very long, and for years he had thought her dead. When he’d finally realized that she was alive, and in the camps, there had been nothing he could do -- a thing that had haunted him daily.

But she hadn’t just survived. In her brief time in the past, she seemed to have thrived, a thing no doubt helped by Logan. She had a strength now that had only been a whispered potential not so long ago. He could feel her struggling, trying to lock the strange, alien presence into one of her mental cells. The fact that she was having such difficulty was worrying.

“Marie,” he said, trying to focus her. “Marie, let me help you.”

She nodded, her jaw clenched and a vein throbbing at her temple.

_Her mind was, as ever, very neatly ordered. It would seem that her time in the camps had reinforced her will, rather than destroying it: the others were all resolutely caged, including something in one of her iron-clad ‘solitary’ rooms. It howled and fought, banging on the walls, but it was as effectively trapped as anything could possibly be._

_The other thing, though -- the Stranger, it called itself, was not so easily bested. It twisted and turned, evading each personality as Marie released it. This must have been how she locked up the other thing, the dark creature in solitary, but it wasn’t working now. The Stranger’s form was intangible, only vaguely humanoid, and all who tried to grab it could find no purchase._

Marie, _he said, trying to augment her power, to give him some measure of his own telepathy without actually touching her._ Focus, Marie. You can do this.

No, _the Stranger said,_ she can’t. I _need_ her. _Its voice was distinctly feminine, though its accent was like nothing he had ever heard before._ Drive me from her and I will return to the other. One way or another, I will finish what I came to do.

_Marie said nothing, but he felt her push, shoving at the Stranger with all the considerable force of her strength. It only made the Stranger smile, and Charles realized, too late, what was going on._

Stop, Marie, _he said, a very faint tinge of desperation in his voice_. It’s feeding off your effort. I know this sounds strange, but your mind is too strong to evict it.

Not entirely foolish, _the Stranger said._ You are not a truly stupid race, for all your stubbornness and morals. I will return her when I am through, unharmed. Until then, you will all stay out of my way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh dear. Sorry, Charles and Marie, but you’ve actually found something that can use your own power against you. Oops. Somebody better get Anathea and Company out of the way, and stop Erik from deliberately throwing Janek under the bus. He’s just a teensy-weensy bit murderous as it is. Can the pair of Charles’s help? Will the two Magneto’s drive Logan to murder someone himself? We will find out.
> 
> The title of this chapter, and the one prior to the last, both come from _Twin Peaks:_  
>  From the days of future past  
> The magician longs to see  
> One chants out between two worlds  
> Fire, walk with me
> 
> Couldn’t figure out a way to use the second verse, but I thought the rest of it fit.


	27. Fire, Walk With Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Logan is...Logan (and the Stranger takes advantage of that), and the clock begins to wind down to their fateful return to France.

Kitty was in no condition to do much of anything, so Clarice threw a series of portals through the house, collecting Anathea and her very startled, sleepy people and dragging them all outside. She’d suggested trying to grab Rogue and portal _her_ away, but Charles had nixed that one in about three seconds flat: should the thing in Rogue’s body touch her, it would have the ability to teleport as well as to phase. As Ororo pointed out, this thing wasn’t like a Sentinel: it could actually _think_.

So she (somehow) found herself driving Charles’s giant boat of a sedan, five people jammed in the back, headed for she didn’t know where. The rest stayed back at the house, trying to deal whatever had possessed Rogue. Just how they were to get in contact with her when (if) they succeeded, she didn’t know, given that this was a decade before even the most primitive of cell phones. Charles had thrown his credit card at her and told her to find a hotel, but not one too close.

Anathea’s people were jabbering in the back, in a mix of broken English and their own odd language, and it was giving her a headache. Anathea herself was trying to calm them down, to explain the somewhat garbled story she’d been told, and Clarice, normally such a sunny person, was ready to kill someone.

“ _SHUT. UP_ ,” she snarled, gripping the steering-wheel so tightly her knuckles were white. Why the hell was she doing this alone? The original plan had been to send Kitty with, as well, until Hank pointed out that there was no way of knowing if the Stranger could return to her head and kill them all by surprise. So Clarice was alone, feeling like she was on the highway to hell. Had that song even come out yet?

“How long will we be away?” Anathea asked, after a very long pause.

“I don’t know,” Clarice sighed. “I don’t know how far we have to go, or if they’ll just overtake us and pick us up before we go to France. All I _do_ know is that I’m finding us a motel and then sleeping for the next nine hours.”

Anathea said nothing, and neither did any of others. Clarice thought they might be too afraid to, but at this point, she didn’t care.

\--

Well, this was certainly a mess.

Clarice had Anathea and her people out of the picture, at least, but they still had to deal with Rogue-the-Stranger. Rogue-the-Stranger, who could walk through walls. At least she hadn’t got hold of Clarice’s ability, or they’d none of them be safe.

Charles rubbed his temples, and was silently glad he had the support of his older self. Logan looked about two breaths away from murder, and Erik the Younger was little better. Raven had gone...neutral...which wasn’t a good sign; she stuck to Hank like glue, as though silently daring the world to touch him. She wouldn’t go after Rogue-the-Stranger -- if it didn’t kill her, Logan would -- but neither would she let it bring Hank any harm.

Not that Charles thought it meant to. From what his elder self said, the entity was not evil so much as alien. It didn’t enjoy killing, wouldn’t go out of its way to do so, but neither would it hold back if it thought killing was necessary.

They knew what Rogue-the-Stranger was. It had gone to Alfred, and they had no real way of rescuing him. Neither Charles could freeze her mind, and her borrowed intangibility made her as impossible to hold as Kitty. He didn’t doubt that it would get all the others...things...it needed from the poor bastard, if it couldn’t get to the rest of his group. 

No, they couldn’t save him, even if any of them had truly wanted to (and even Charles could admit to himself that losing him wasn’t precisely a hardship, though he didn’t enjoy the thought). What they had to do was figure out a way to get the Stranger out of Marie’s head through some other means than telepathy. And that, unfortunately, none of them had a clue how to accomplish. How did one deal with something that fed on whatever strength was used against it?

Shaw had done that, Charles knew, in some way, but Erik’s solution was hardly practical here. They needed to evict the thing from Marie’s head without hurting her, let alone killing her. If anything happened to her, he didn’t doubt Logan would go after every single one of them.

“We should trick it into the head of someone we can actually restrain,” Erik said, staring at the heart in the jar. They’d retreated to the kitchen, as it would be the easiest place to flee from, should they need to get out of the house in a hurry.

“You volunteerin’?” Logan asked

“You couldn’t restrain _me,_ ” he retorted. “There’s far too much metal around. We shouldn’t have sent all of Anathea’s people away.”

“That’s harsh,” Kitty said, glowering at him.

“It doesn’t matter,” the elder Charles said. “It isn’t an entity that can be tricked. I’ve never felt anything so powerful in my life, and if it feeds off Rogue’s strength, fighting it will only make it worse.”

“So what do we _do_?” Hank asked.

Then ensuing silence was absolute. No one, it seemed, had any idea.

“Kitty, I want you to get me in there,” Logan said, thoughtful in a way Charles had rarely heard, even in the future. “I wanna talk to her.” His glare traveled from one Charles to the other, daring either to protest. Evidently, even the younger had learned there were times it was simply best not to argue.

The look Kitty gave him was dubious, but she didn’t say anything, either. “Okay,” she agreed, after a pause. “But if I leave you in there, you’re stuck.”

“I know,” he said grimly. “I’m countin’ on that.”

That statement was so odd that Charles had to take a brief look into his mind, to see just what on Earth he was planning. It was quite simple: he just wanted to talk to Marie -- to _Marie_ , not the Stranger. Kitty hadn’t killed Erik, so there was definitely no way Marie would try to kill him -- and even if she did, he was rather more difficult to kill.

“Your funeral,” young Erik muttered. “Or will be.”

Charles had forgotten just how obnoxious Erik could be, as a young man. Possibly because he hadn’t been so immune to that himself. How peculiar it was, seeing them both still so estranged, divided by a gulf wide as the Grand Canyon despite how closely they worked together. 

Erik twitched when Kitty kicked him under the table, glowering at him. He glowered right back, but subsided. Now _that_ was...peculiar, and unsettling, and not something Charles cared to examine.

“Behave,” she warned, getting up with a wince. “Okay, Logan. I’m going to stick around outside for a while, so scream if you need to get out.”

Charles couldn’t imagine any circumstance under which Logan would possibly do that, but Kitty probably had to lurk anyway, for the sake of her own conscience. It made sense, too -- should Marie decided to abandon the bunker and trap Logan inside, she’d be his only way out. 

“You can’t stay out there alone,” Erik the Younger said, standing with her.

Kitty rolled her eyes. “What are you, my mother?” she groused.

“I’d hope not,” older Erik muttered. Apparently, he found the entire thing as disturbing as Charles -- but then, he would, since young Erik _was_ him.

“He’s right,” Ororo said. “Rogue might not kill you, Logan, but she _could_ very well jump ship, if the Stranger thinks you’re gaining too much influence.”

“Actually,” Kitty said, “I’ve been thinking about that. I can phase through damn near anything, which mean Rogue can, too, but...could we actually phase through each other? Maybe I could sort of grab her and hang on, so she couldn’t run.”

“You phased right through her hand, when she grabbed _you_ ,” Logan pointed out.

“Yeah, but she hadn’t fully absorbed my ability yet. It’s worth a shot, isn’t it?”

Logan shook his head. “Kitty, even if that worked, there’s still the problem of you weighin’ about as much as an actual cat.”

“Rogue’s not exactly She-Ra right now,” she countered. “I’ll take you in to talk to her, but if that doesn’t work...well, it’s worth a shot.”

Now it was Logan who rolled his eyes. “Fine. Let’s get this circus on the road.”

\--

Though most of them smelled some degree of nervous, Logan...really wasn’t. He was too angry. How _dare_ this thing, this Stranger, worm its way into the school? And how dare it take _Marie_ hostage? It shouldn’t be near any one of them, but with Marie...well, it had gone and made it personal. Marie had fought the Memories for him, so he’d damn well fight the Stranger for her.

Kitty got him into the bunker without a fuss, and went back outside to lurk with damn near all of them. He had a feeling that at least one of the Magnetos was just there out of curiosity as to whether or not Marie really would kill him. Assholes, both of them.

The light inside was dim, but more than enough for his feral eyes. Alfred was just as Kitty had described: standing at an awkward angle, one foot fused into the floor. He really _did_ look like a goddamn zombie, too; his skin was almost grey, face almost but not entirely vacant, teeth still bloody from where he’d bitten Magneto (good zombie). He snarled when he saw Logan, flailing in a way that would have been funny, if there hadn’t been something so horribly unnatural about it.

Marie-the-Stranger stood facing Alfred, well out of reach, watching him like he was some particularly interesting kind of bug. Just like possessed-Kitty, she stood preternaturally still, hands folded behind her back, but her expression was one of open fascination.

“There is no point, you know,” the Stranger said, not looking at him. “I will return her when I am through. I do not harm my vessels.”

“Make it sound like you do this a lot,” he said, ambling closer, very slowly, giving it plenty of space and time to track his movement.

“It is the only way I may leave. She could not come, but I could. I did. And I will return when my task is done.”

Well, that was weird and cryptic, but that seemed to be par for the course anymore. “You won’t get Anathea or any of the rest of ’em,” he said, almost conversationally. “They’re gone, so what in the hell are you doin’ with him?” He was genuinely curious.

“He is...not a normal result,” the Stranger said. “When I take, the owner goes silent and still, dead but not quite. I have never seen this before.”

Figured that fucking _Alfred_ would be the exception. “All the more reason we don’t wanna let you near the other five. Now, if you’re after the Memories, that’s your call, but you don’t get to use us. We’ve got our own shit to do.”

Finally it turned to him, and the sight of Marie’s face chilled him even more than Kitty’s had done. Her expression was so smooth, so serene, but her eyes _burned_. They weren’t just alien, they were ancient -- twin wells of experience so deep he couldn’t even fathom it. “You have no idea what the Memories are, do you?”

“We know enough,” he said, physically shaking himself -- but he couldn’t tear his own eyes away. “I wanna talk to Marie.”

“She sleeps,” the Stranger said. “She is unharmed.”

“Yeah, well, I wanna make sure of that myself,” he said firmly. “Marie, darlin’, if you’re in there, wake up.”

The Stranger sighed. “She is too strong for you to wake. Her power is her cocoon, and she will wake when I say she might.”

It said that, but Logan noticed that it didn’t look away, either. “Marie, this is Logan,” he said. “I wanna talk to you. I _need_ to talk to you. I’d love to let this thing hack Alfred into chutney, but I don’t want you bein’ the one doin’ it. It’d hurt you too much later, so say somethin’, darlin’. C’mon back to me.”

A shudder wracked her entire frame, and he could practically smell the Stranger’s hold slip. It was only for a moment, but it was there, unmistakable to anyone who actually knew Marie. The Stranger backed away from him, its blank expression not quite so blank -- there was wariness to it now.

“See, this thing’s runnin’ scared now. Walkin’ scared. Whatever. I’m thinkin’ it’s ’cause you’re movin’, and it doesn’t know what to do about it. Now, you beat the Memories for me, so it’s my turn to help you beat this. Stranger, I got an idea. You hop on outta her head and take me. I’ve done so much horrible shit in my life that a little more won’t mean a damn thing. You wanna _real_ host? I’m the closest thing to immortal you’re gonna find in this world. Go on and head for me, and we’ll fuck shit up however you want. No organ theft required.”

The Stranger’s steps faltered, coming to a halt. “You would _volunteer_ yourself?” it asked, completely nonplussed.

He snorted. “If if was for anybody else? Hell no. But she’s _Marie_. She made it pretty goddamn clear to me that I’m hers, and that goes both ways. So let’s get the fuck outta here and you take the wheel.” He knew -- or at least, he _hoped_ he knew; the Professor damn well better be right about this -- that it couldn’t make him hurt any of their companions. Aside from that, he didn’t really care what he did. If it got Marie back, it was worth it.

The Stranger was quiet a moment, and he hoped that meant it was considering. Maybe he needed to sweeten the deal.

“Look,” he said, popping his claws. “Even got my own weapons. C’mon, what do you say?”

“You cannot burn?” it asked, eyes lingering on his claws. “You will heal, if you burn?”

“Bet your ass I will. Now get me outta here and let’s do this.” Marie might never forgive him for this, but she’d be alive, and she’d be whole -- and she wouldn’t have any potential mass-murder on her hands. And hell, they and the Stranger _did_ have the same goal in mind.

It held out a gloved hand, its expression somehow wary and greedy. He guided it away from the area where the others waited, not wanting them to all jump in like the lunatics they were. 

“That’s it,” he said. “Take us out.”

The sun was rising, casting Marie’s face a pale gold. The Stranger stripped off one glove, and laid Marie’s small hand on his face.

“Fire, walk with me,” it said, and then there was only pain.

\--

Ororo took off when she heard Logan scream, followed by Rogue, and Kitty limped along after her like Igor to Doctor Frankenstein. She didn’t think anybody had expected Rogue to actually come _out_ of the bunker, even the Professors, but she very obviously had. 

They rounded a clump of bushes, and Kitty almost ran right into him. One look and her heart sank: she was pretty sure she knew why they were both outside. The Stranger had jumped hosts again.

Which, wait, that made no sense, Kitty thought, even as she went to help Rogue. Sure, h was physically much stronger, but he didn’t have Rogue’s abilities -- he couldn’t kill with just a touch, and he sure as hell couldn’t absorb anyone else’s powers, which were both, quite frankly, a lot more useful than his claws.

He was, however, damn near immortal. If it had been willing to abandon Rogue for him, it must plan on a lot more up-close-and-personal fighting than she’d be capable of at the moment.

Kitty glanced at Ororo, silently asking just what the hell they were supposed to do now. Unfortunately, Ororo didn’t seem to have any more clue than she did.

“Uh, Stranger?” Kitty said, trying to support Rogue without falling over. Really, the poor woman was still too physically frail to be doing half the shit they’d done in the last week. “Why do you have Logan now?”

The thing looked at her through Logan’s eyes. Jesus, the way it controlled people might just be the creepiest thing she’d ever seen, and that was really, really saying something.

“He will not die. He can walk with fire.”

She looked again at Ororo, who seemed just as confused. Much as she wanted to ask just what in mother fuck that meant, she had a feeling they were going to find out all too soon.

“Are you still gonna go after Anathea and her people?” she asked, trying to swallow a sudden spike of dread. If it said yes -- if it tried to use Logan for anything...stupid -- well, there _was_ a solution. She didn’t like it -- nobody would, especially Logan or Rogue -- but it was _there._

_Don’t make me rip out Logan’s heart don’t make me rip out Logan’s heart I don’t think I could do that_

“No,” it said. “I do not need them now.”

“Good,” Ororo said, fixing it with a hard stare, “because we do.”

“Even Alfred E. Zombie in there,” Kitty added. “Don’t know _why_ , but we do. And if you went around ripping out their organs left and right, shipping them all to France would be kind of difficult.”

The Stranger gave her a blank stare, as so many people seemed to do. It was so close to a few of the looks Erik had given her that she almost choked.

“Rogue, you have to come with us,” Ororo said, breaking Kitty away from her slightly disturbed thoughts. Poor Rogue looked like she was in shock -- _real_ shock, the sort you go into when you’ve lost a limb. Which, Kitty thought, in a way she had. Emotionally, Logan was another part of her, and now Logan wasn’t the one at home.

“He did it because he loves you, Rogue,” Kitty said, answering the question Rogue probably wasn’t capable of asking right now. Heroically, she didn’t even add, duh, and not just because it would be in very poor taste: the whole thing was so obvious that she didn’t really need to. She doubted even Anathea and her group would have been at all surprised. 

Both Professors came wheeling around the bushes, each as grave as the other. They were followed by Raven and Hank, who came forward to check on Rogue. She barely even noticed him, being too intent on staring at Logan-the-Stranger. Kitty couldn’t quite decide if her shifting expression was turning into pity or murder.

“Stranger,” the elder Professor said, eyeing Logan. “I think it might be best if you tell us just what you are, and where you’ve come from. If you truly do stand against the Memories, we should know.”

Logan-the-Stranger looked at him. “Not yet,” it said, after a rather long pause, in which it inspected him closely. “There are things that must be done first. Things I must do. You should all rest, while you can.”

It sounded like a goddamn wonderful idea to Kitty, who hadn’t slept in almost twenty-four hours. At this point, she didn’t care if a Memory tried to eat her face off, as long as she got a nap first.

“Where are you going?” the younger Professor asked. He looked more fascinated than his elder self, though no less wary.

Its answer was so bizarre that Kitty’s exhausted brain didn’t try to figure it out. “I need fire. Stay. I will come back.”

Logan-the-Stranger turned, and walked past them before anyone could speak. Kitty wasn’t sure anyone actually wanted to, because really, what the hell was there to say? Somebody would probably think up something, but she planned to be asleep by the time they did it.

“Come on, Rogue,” she said, as gently as she could. “After having that thing in your head, you need some rest. You know he’ll come back. He’s Logan.”

She blinked, a little of _herself_ returning to her eyes. “I know,” she said. “But...shit, Kitty, he can’t do what I do. What if that thing gets him killed?”

“How can it? No, he can’t do what you do, but he can do what _he_ does, which is survive everything up to an atomic bomb. And maybe even that. Right now you need to sleep, and somebody need to tell Clarice to get her ass back here. I’m sure she’ll be happy to, after being stuck in a car with a bunch of terrified kids who barely speak English.” 

Once they’d all had a damn nap, and could actually _think_ , they’d have to come up with something to do about the Stranger. It might say it didn’t kill its hosts, or the people it took organs from, but like anyone was going to trust that. At least, she hoped they wouldn’t, or she’d be very, very disappointed.

Fortunately, Hank took over her attempts at supporting Rogue, leading the poor woman toward the house. Given that the Stranger’s vacating had left Kitty feeling a lot like she had a hangover, Rogue probably had it at least as bad, and still wasn’t in the greatest physical condition to deal with something like that.

Kitty followed them, Ororo at her side. When they reached the kitchen, she didn’t even bother trying to haul herself up to the room -- she collapsed onto the threadbare couch and fell into something almost like a coma.

\--

Hank and Raven led Rogue to the infirmary, both Charleses in tow. Erik, realizing he could be of approximately zero use, left them to it, and instead sat and stared at the heart. The adrenaline that had driven him was fading fast, and if he wasn’t careful, he was going to wind up as unconscious as Kitty, without the luxury of anything worth sleeping on. 

He really didn’t want to go to sleep in the same room as that creepy, creepy heart, so he poked her awake, and barely dodged another slap. “Up,” he said, trying to pull her to her feet, wincing when he took an inadvertent elbow to the gut. (He was pretty sure it was inadvertent; if she’d meant to do it, it probably would have hurt a lot more.) 

“You’d better have a goddamn good reason for waking me up,” she grumbled, rubbing her eyes.

“Kittens,” he said, figuring that would be only thing that would get her moving. 

Sure enough, it worked, even if she was limping like a drunk, and almost ran right through the wall beside the doorway. “Kick me and I drop you,” he said, picking her up. Logan was right -- she really didn’t weigh much more than a cat, which at least made traversing the length of the wing fairly easy. 

She didn’t kick him, but that was possibly only because she fell asleep halfway there. She stirred a little when they actually reached the room, because he almost tripped when three of the kittens decided to attack his ankles. Clarice wouldn’t be needing her mattress for a bit, so Kitty got to steal it, as well as half the kittens, which crawled all over her like she was a very tiny tree to be scaled.

There was so much to do, to plan, to think about, and at the moment, Erik didn’t give half a shit about any of it. All he cared about was shutting his eyes, and not opening them for a good nine hours. He was not, he was quite certain, the only one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaand Logan-the-Stranger is on the loose! It will have some things to say, before they go to France: just where the Memories come from, and what the hell they're going to do to get rid of them. With any luck, nobody will actually die.


	28. Stranger

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which bacon fixes many things, Clarice did not have a good night, and we find out more about both Stranger and Memories.
> 
> Warning: A.) this chapter is _really really_ long, and B.) it’s kind of gory in places. Be Ye Warned.

Marie woke up sore, disoriented, and incredibly pissed off.

Oh, she understood why Logan had taken the Stranger. She would have done the same thing, if their positions were reversed -- but that didn’t mean she had to be happy about it. And now he was out God knew where, doing God knew what...no, she was very, very far from happy.

Someone must have brought her back to the communal room after she’d fallen asleep, because there was a kitten under her chin. She shifted it as she opened her eyes, and found it blinking sleepily at her. It yawned, and stretched out its little paws, toes splayed. Okay, it was a little harder to be angry when faced with that, but still. Whenever Logan was himself again, they were going to have Words.

Meanwhile, she needed to brush her teeth, eat something, and find out if anybody else was awake yet. She needed at least one of the Professors -- neither were in here, but she didn’t know if it meant they were awake, or if they’d just been smart enough to sleep somewhere else. Ororo, Hank, and Raven were all dead to the world, and Kitty -- 

Um. Yeah, not going to mentally address _that_ right now.

She frowned when realized there was no sign of Clarice. The Professor -- either of them -- had to have given her the all-clear to come back at some point, right? Maybe she’d been smart and found somewhere else to sleep, too.

The clock in the hallway said it was a little after three in the afternoon -- no wonder she was so hungry. Down to the kitchen she went, stomach grumbling all the while, growing ever more uneasy and irritated. It was a strange combination of emotions, that probably shouldn’t have been possible, but there she was.

As it turned out, the elder Professor and the elder Magneto were up, eating toast and sharing a pot of tea. Marie’s brain came to a brief but screeching halt, because that was just so, so _wrong_. While they had never actually hated one another, she still didn’t know just when or how they’d reconciled -- the ‘why’ was a fairly easy guess, at least -- and her mind still insisted they ought to be enemies. It didn’t help that all her instincts still considered Magneto _her_ enemy: she was just starting to reconcile herself to the fact that the younger one wasn’t a completely murderous asshole. Asking her mind to do that again, with the one who actually _had_ tried to kill her...she wasn’t sure she could do it. Not on top of everything else.

She gave them both a somewhat vague greeting, and dug a frying pan out of the cupboard. There was a gigantic pack of bacon in the fridge, and she knew that she could cook _that_ , even if she wasn’t particularly good at much else. Logan would probably eat half of it himself -- if he came back. Oh God, what if he didn’t? What if the Stranger decided to take him to France all on its own?

“Rogue,” the Professor said, jerking her out of her thoughts. “Marie. The Stranger is not an evil thing. It gains nothing by killing its host.”

She turned to him, trying to rip open the bacon while she was at it. “How do you know that, though? Did you get to talk to it more, when it was in his head? It said it doesn’t care if we die.”

“But it also doesn’t want us to. Logan is the closest thing in this world to a true immortal, but even knowing that, it won’t lead him against the Memories without us. It says we can’t do this alone, but neither can it.”

She hoped he was right. But then, this was the Professor: how often was he actually _wrong?_ “You’re goin’ with us, aren’t you?” she asked, her eyes flicking between him and Magneto. It wasn’t really much of a question.

“We could hardly leave you to go on your own,” Magneto said. “Our younger selves are...young. They simply don’t have the experience we do. They don’t have any choice but to go into that basement, but we can stand guard, and do all we can from the outside.”

Marie finally got the bacon open. “My granny -- my dream-visitor -- told me we might not all get out alive,” she said. “What I’m worried about is that _none_ of us might. More I learn about these things, the more I wonder -- I’m sure we can fix it, that we can at least seal off that damn basement again, but at what cost?”

Neither said anything, because they didn’t get a chance -- to her great surprise, the phone rang. Who in hell could be calling? Logan? She had a hard time imagining the Stranger using a phone, for some reason. After a slight hesitation, she answered it, trying not to drop the damn bacon. “Hello?”

“Rogue?” It was Clarice, and she sounded just about at the end of her tether. “Thank God, was hoping someone would be awake. We, uh, we have a problem.”

“Where are you?” Marie asked, already knowing she wasn’t going to like the answer.

“You know how I kinda suck at driving a stick shift? Well, I sort of...rear-ended someone. They found out I was driving without a license, so...well, I got arrested. We all got arrested. So, um. Yeah. Somebody needs to come and bail us out.”

Marie groaned. She wasn’t sure if the Professor even had another car. “Hang on a sec, Clarice,” she said, covering the speaker. “Professor, please tell me you had more than one car in 1973. We have to go bail out Clarice and the others.”

Magneto put a hand over his face, and sighed. The Professor, on the other hand, looked torn between exasperation and amusement. “I didn’t,” he said, “but it’s easy enough to call a taxi. Or rather, a pair of taxis, considering how many people are involved. I would suggest sending Hank and my younger self, since they’re the only ones who have valid identification.”

Because both of them were likely to be thrilled by _that_. “Okay. Clarice? We’re gonna send Hank and the young Professor to get you. Try not to kill anyone while you’re at it, okay? Why didn’t you just use your portals?”

Clarice snorted. “They’re not exactly subtle,” she said. “And we’re trying to avoid outing ourselves as mutants just yet. I’ve had a hard enough time trying to deal with all these kids and their complete English failure, which, let me tell you, has not been fun. If somebody doesn’t get out here pretty damn fast, I’m going to strangle them all.” 

Marie tried not to laugh, and just barely succeeded. “I’ll get ’em on their way,” she said, and when she’d hung up, she laughed into her sleeve for a good five minutes. “I know this sounds horrible, but I wish I coulda seen that. Not sure Anathea and her crew have any concept of law enforcement at all. God knows what they did.”

“God knows what who did?” Ororo asked. “I smell bacon.”

“Clarice got arrested. Need Hank and the Professor -- young Professor -- to go get ’em out.”

“Because that’s the best way to start the day,” Ororo sighed. “I hope the Stranger doesn’t get Logan arrested.”

Oh God, Marie hadn’t even thought of that. “Thanks, ’Ro,” she muttered. “Because I needed _that_ on my mind.”

Ororo winced. “Sorry. I’ll go find them, but save me some bacon.”

“Don’t think that’ll be a problem,” Marie said, dumping the rest of the pack into the pan. “Without Logan to inhale it all, I could probably feed a pack of wolves.” _Where are you, Logan?_ she thought, poking at the bacon with a spatula. _I can’t yell at you for being a gallant dumbass if you’re not_ here. And she would. Oh, she would, once everything was over. And he’d better be alive to hear it.

\--

Kitty woke with a headache, a kitten under her nose, and Erik breathing down the back of her neck.

Um. One of these things was not like the others. Okay, none of them were like the others, but still. One of them was just a teensy bit _wrong_ \-- or at least, it should be. By now, she was kind of past being bothered by much of anything.

She shifted the kitten, very carefully -- which was somewhat difficult, since it didn’t want to be shifted. It was the white one, who sank her little claws into the pillow, glowered with wide kitten eyes, and tried to bite Kitty’s nose. She had to noogie the little fuzzy head until the critter scampered off, squeaking all the while.

Shifting his arm was a bit harder, since it was basically dead weight. While Kitty herself was somewhat beyond being embarrassed by...well, much of anything, she was pretty sure he’d be mortified if he woke up like this. Sure, _she_ wasn’t going to misinterpret it, but that didn’t mean nobody else would. And any and all prank war crap was pretty much suspended until they got back from France.

“Go back to sleep,” he muttered.

Kitty blinked, and froze. “Are you fucking kidding me?” she grumbled under her breath. “You’re awake?”

“Obviously. And I’d rather not be.”

She shook her head. “You do realize what this looks like, right?”

He sighed. “At this point, do you even care what it looks like to any of those idiots? You were having a nightmare, and you refused to shut up until you weren’t by yourself. Now take your own advice, and go the fuck to sleep.”

She snorted, and immediately sneezed from the sheer volume of cat hair she inhaled. “I need some aspirin. Lemme up and I’ll grab you a kitten.” 

He sighed again, and it was the most obnoxiously put-upon sound she’d ever heard. “There’s already one trying to climb my back. Fine. Just don’t sneeze your brain out through your nose.”

Somehow, she managed to struggle to her feet, despite the kitten that attacked her ankles as soon as she moved. She opened her mouth to make some sort of retort (she honestly wasn’t sure just what, but it would be sarcastic and wonderful, dammit) and sneezed again. “Hush, you,” she said, before he could even open his mouth. “Can you clean that litterbox when you decided to join the world of the living?” she added, prying a kitten off her leg so she could fill the food bowl. They scampered after her like adorable, starving wolves, attacking the bowl like they were afraid it would get up and run away.

She couldn’t tell if his answering grunt was agreement or disagreement, and she didn’t hang around long enough to find out. Her head was positively thumping, and she detoured to the infirmary for some aspirin before heading to the kitchen.

Rogue had made bacon, and the smell of it was a little stronger than she could stomach. She waved a vague good-afternoon, fixed herself a plate and a mug of coffee, and wandered out onto the lawn, searching for a shady tree. Of course it was approaching the hottest part of the day, but that didn’t really matter to her. The air was fresh, and there was a very slight breeze. It wasn’t perfect, but it was hardly horrible. The caffeine soothed her her head, and there wasn’t much that bacon couldn’t ease. 

The car eased down the driveway while she ate, and she blinked in surprise: had Clarice actually been out all this time? Where the hell had she _gone_? 

Hank crawled out, and helped the young Professor into his wheelchair. Clarice, who looked ready to skin someone alive, stomped out and slammed the door, stalking across the lawn like an avenging Fate. Kitty barely managed to restrain her laughter -- sure, it looked funny as hell, but Clarice had obviously had a very, _very_ bad night.

“Bacon,” she said, holding the plate up like she was presenting an award. Clarice, still visibly fuming, actually grabbed a handful and stuffed it into her mouth.

“Don’t choke on that,” Kitty said, sipping coffee. Of course she then sneezed, and snorted it all over her own feet.

Clarice laughed so hard she almost _did_ choke. Some of the tension left her shoulders. “God, Kitty, you should have been there. We rear-ended this guy, right, and of course I don’t have a license. I had to pretend I was a punk from New York City, and then explain what ‘punk’ was, because I think it might actually be too early for that. None of Anathea’s crew would shut up, and because their English is so terrible, the cops wanted to call in someone from fucking _INS_. Professor had to have used his telepathy on them all, or we never would have made it out.”

Kitty winced, but that didn’t stop her laughing. “Well, you missed some shit here, too,” she said. “The Stranger jumped into Logan, and I don’t know if anybody knows where he went after that. I just woke up, myself. Good news is that the Stranger says it doesn’t need anybody else’s organs now, so Anathea and her guys are safe from _that_ , at least.”

Anathea herself, looking indescribably weary, wandered over, Janek in tow. She didn’t seem tremendously enthusiastic about having him with her, but neither did she chase him away.

“Bacon,” Kitty said, holding a piece out. Anathea took it, sniffed, and ate a tentative bite. The transformation in her expression was so hysterical that Kitty burst out laughing, and immediately sneezed again.

Janek took a piece, too, and gave her a smile that somehow managed to be shy and a little creepy. Half the time he seemed completely terrified of her, and she still didn’t know why. “Safe?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she said. _Until we get to France, anyway_. But that was not something to burden any of them with. She still wasn’t sure what (or what not) Anathea had told them about any of it. “You’re safe.”

“You safe?” he asked, pointing what remained of his bacon at her.

 _I can rip people’s hearts out, kid_ , she thought. _Think I’m safe from almost anything_. Aloud, she said, “We’re all good. Don’t worry.”

Of course, no sooner had she finished speaking than Logan appeared at the edge of the yard.

\--

Clarice portaled into the kitchen so abruptly that Erik almost swallowed his fork. She jabbered something indecipherable, grabbed Marie, and portaled out again.

He traded a look with both his older self and the elder Charles. There were relatively few reasons the woman would do such a thing, and smart money was on the reappearance of Logan-the-Stranger. The trio of them moved out onto the porch, Erik morbidly curious as to just what could go wrong _now_.

Logan looked...well, wherever he’d been, it hadn’t been kind to him. His clothes were badly burned, and it was probably only his healing factor that kept him from being a walking, talking char-broiled hamburger. His face was as blank as it had been the previous night, but the eyes were, somehow, even more uncomfortable to look at. Before, they had merely burned; now, they almost seemed to glow.

Marie, who Erik suspected wouldn’t be deterred by much of anything, marched right up to Logan, eyeing him closely. “Stranger, is he still okay in there?” she demanded.

“He sleeps,” the Stranger replied. “He will have no memory of what he has endured.”

That...sounded rather disturbing. There were times Erik cursed his somewhat unfortunately vivid imagination, and now was one of them. The smell didn’t help, either: ever since he’d been a child, since his time in the camp, he’d hated the smell of smoke. Logan stank like smoke _and_ burned flesh, which absolutely did not help.

“Stranger,” Charles -- the elder Charles -- said, “I think you need to tell us what you know. We need to know about the Memories, if we are to have any chance of succeeding.”

Logan-the-Stranger looked at him. It was a keen, piercing, assessing look, as though it were trying to read his soul. Charles met it with equanimity, until eventually the Stranger nodded.

“I will show you,” it said, “and you will show them. The other half would say she is sorry, so I will say it for her.”

Well, that was nice and cryptic. Erik wondered, a little sourly, if the Stranger practiced at that, or if it just came naturally. He stood aside to let it pass, and didn’t follow right away; Marie went by him as well, hot on the Stranger’s heels, Clarice and Kitty trailing behind her. It didn’t take long for them all to crowd into the kitchen, which swiftly became absolutely sweltering thanks to the sheer number of people crammed into it.

“The Memories killed the other half,” the Stranger said, taking a seat opposite the older Charles. “She came back as me. What I will show you is her last minutes.”

Charles nodded, and Erik wasn’t the only one who tensed. He was curious, but he was also very, very wary --

 _It had happened in the Other -- home, sweet deadly home. Nobody knew just who first called it that, or when, or why, but it was the only name that strange parasite of a world had. A zombie of a world, neither living nor fully dead, a reality separated from Earth by less than half a breath. People disappeared into it with alarming regularity, falling through the cracks that formed between the two, and most didn't survive. And the few who did, who escaped back to Earth, always ran the risk of being pulled in again. It really_ was _a parasite world, taking what it could get and holding fast to it like glue._

_It was a hot, arid place, the sky dull red and without a sun. Once upon a time it had been as alive as ever Earth could be, but Time there had always been a fractured thing, and when war laid waste to it, it had no chance of recovery. That had been long, long before she was born; she'd never known it any other way._

_Precious few areas were anything like safe, but you could survive, if you knew how to navigate, and Sharley did. There were places even she feared to tread, though, places nothing sane, mortal or not, would go of their own will. And Old Echo was the worst of them._

_It had been a thriving town once, very long ago, and outwardly the war hadn't touched it much. Ancient though it was in the Other, it looked like it had been something out of quaint, small-town Americana, a postcard of a place Normal Rockwell would have drooled over. It made its current desolation that much worse, this dead little burgh filled only with dust and silence._

_She and little Marty had stumbled through a crack that led straight there, in autumn of 1970, and they weren't alone. If only Earth knew where so many of its missing children went: for some reason, kids passed between the cracks far more easily than adults, and at the edge of Old Echo Sharley found eleven of them. Scared, dirty, borderline starving, huddled together on the heaved, buckled remains of what had at one point been a sidewalk._

_They were so_ young, _too; the oldest couldn't have been more than twelve, all sunburn and freckles and tangled curly hair, his eyes blue wells of terror. Sharley sighed._

_"You sent someone in there, didn't you?" she asked, taking Marty's hand._

_The boy nodded. His eyes were swollen, his cheeks red and puffy, and when he spoke, his voice had the hoarse quality that came from having cried until you had nothing left. "My sister," he said. "She said she was gonna go see what was in there, and she didn't want the rest of us to, because…."_

_He trailed off, hiccupping, but Sharley understood the 'because'. Old Echo looked like no more than a ghost town, but there was a sense of malevolence here unlike anything she'd found anywhere else in either world, a malice imprinted so deeply on the walls and streets that it radiated outward like heat. The problem with this town was not that it was dead -- the problem was that it_ wasn't. _It was a twisted kind of genius loci, a place with its own awareness. All the Other had a kind of sentience, but in Old Echo it was much more pronounced, and evil in way that could be all too personal for those who ventured in._

_But the only way to get somewhere safe was to pass through it. Her foster-aunt lived in the Swamp, some ten miles beyond the town, and the only danger one would face there was stepping off the path and drowning in a bog. It was one of the Other's precious few havens, but if she could get those kids there, she might be able to figure out what to do with them._

_And she had to go herself, anyway. There was no way back the way she'd come: the cracks didn't go both ways. Her foster-aunt could help her find a way back to Earth, but the only way forward lay through this town of invisible, unrelenting horror._

_Sharley picked up Marty, trying not to hold her too tightly. Little Marty, with her father's blonde hair and her mother's mismatched eyes -- Marty had never been here, though Sharley had told her a few stories from what she recalled of her own childhood. The girl probably wasn't much safer in her mother's arms, but not for anything would Sharley put her down._

_"Follow me," she said quietly, trying to keep her own instinctive fear from her voice. The sweat that dampened her T-shirt had little to do with the heat. "There's rules in here, and if you follow them you might get through."_

_It was almost disturbing, how willing the children were to listen to her. She was an adult, and most of them were so young that that made her, in their eyes, infallible. It wasn't a thing she liked, because she wasn't sure their trust was warranted. They stood, huddling around her like chicks around a mother hen. No, she couldn't let on how terrified she was herself._

_"There's gonna be some things in there," she went on, somehow keeping her voice steady. "They'll look like people, but they're not. Don't look at them, don't talk to them, and don't follow them. And whatever you do,_ don't run _."_

_"What things?" the boy asked, and Sharley shut her eyes, trying to slow the jackhammering of her heart. She wasn't about to explain the particulars. Not now._

_"Just…things," she said. "Follow me."_

_She led them slowly, letting them press as close to her as they could. Dust that had lain undisturbed for decades swirled up as they walked, hazing the empty, silent buildings. The nearest shop still had one intact window, a big plate-glass thing gone milky with a cataract of grime. A wooden sign, the letters long since faded, hung drunkenly from one hook above it, strips of green paint still clinging to it here and there. Sharley didn't know just what had happened to Old Echo during the war, what could have wiped it out and left so few marks. Even the descendants of those who had survived it didn't know -- or didn't want to._

_Marty twined her arms around Sharley's neck, burying her face in the soft, worn fabric of her T-shirt. The little girl was shivering, but unlike some of the others, she wasn't making a sound. And that was good -- quiet was good. Quiet might be the only way to escape the notice of the creatures that had taken residence here, trapped within the limits of this nightmare town. Only the scuffle of the little group's feet and the faint whimpers of the youngest gave any indication they were here at all._

_She swallowed, her throat unbelievably dry, eyes darting into every shadow. Old Echo was only six blocks long, and once they were past it, the only dangers would be the garden-variety sort you found everywhere in the Other. The evil in this place was chained to it, hemmed in because it could not be destroyed, not even by those who called themselves gods._

_"They're here. Jesus fucking Christ, Sharley, they're coming." Kurt was so close he was practically hiding in her ear, and hearing him so afraid was just_ wrong. _Kurt was the asshole, the one who feared next to nothing, but even he knew what they were about to face. "Don't run."_

_"She's not gonna run," Layla whispered, from somewhere right behind her head. "She's not stupid."_

_Knowing Kurt, he was already preparing some nasty retort, but it died when something shifted in the shadow up ahead._

_It was subtle, so much so that she might have missed it. They always were, though, giving no indication of their existence until they were practically right next to you._

_"Remember what I said, guys," she murmured. "Don't look, don't talk, don't follow."_

_And no sooner had she spoken than they came. They poured through the darkened, yawning doorways of stores, of houses, streaming out in utter silence._

_They really did look like people. Men, women, children of all ages, the color of their clothing a startling contrast to the washed-out sepia of their surroundings. Their faces, though, gave them away: inhumanly blank, with no more animation than a mannequin. Only their eyes were alive, in a sense, flat and glassy but with a terrible inhuman intelligence lurking just beneath the surface -- a malicious awareness so strong it was palpable. In their silence they were suffocating, the combined malevolence of what she knew to be a hive-mind so oppressive she could hardly breathe. Her legs went weak at the feel of them, but she forced herself onward, knowing that if she caved now none of them were getting out alive. She'd made it through here once, years ago; she could do it again, goddammit._

_"Mama, what are they?" Marty whispered._

_"Memories," Sharley said, as steadily as she could. "They can't get us if we don't run." That wasn't strictly true: the Memories_ could _attack any time they chose, but for reasons of their own they seemed to prefer fleeing prey._

_There were more of them now, lining either side of the street like spectators at a parade, and now their silence made her want to scream. The children were all too afraid to even speak, but it was all Sharley could do to keep her mouth shut, and to keep an eye on all those kids who could be such easy prey for the damn things._

_"Two blocks," Layla muttered. "Two blocks, two blocks." She said it like a chant, singsong, and Sharley wished she'd shut the fuck up, because if anything would be able to hear the voices, it would be the Memories. She didn't know how they perceived the world around them, how they saw or heard or thought, but she didn't want to tempt it._

_One small boy finally broke and tried to make a run for it, unable to handle the tension any longer, and she reached out like a striking snake, grabbing the collar of his shirt and yanking him back to her. "Don't. Run," she hissed, and he burst into tears._

_The effect on the Memories was galvanic. As one they stepped forward, the whole crowd moving with a synchronization that was beyond eerie. Though they stretched out seeking hands, they didn't actually approach the little group, and Sharley thought she knew why. They were letting the living stew in their own terror, letting it grow and build with every step, and it pissed her off. Anger was good, though: it kept a little of her own fear at bay, enough that she could keep moving._

_"Two blocks, two blocks," Layla chanted, and Sharley ground her teeth, gripping Marty even tighter. Layla was right: just two more blocks and they were free._ Two blocks, _she thought._ Two blocks and we're out.

_And then the Memories moved._

_They closed in across the far end of the road, first two, then four, then more than twenty, and Sharley froze, dragging the children to a stop._

_"What the fuck?" Kurt croaked. "They can't--"_

_"They can," Sharley murmured, "they just don't." She wasn't the only one who had been through Old Echo and lived to tell about it, and all the other stories bore out her original experience: Memories didn't hinder you. They waited until you went mad with your own fear and took off. What they did to those they caught, nobody knew, but so far as anybody had been able to discover, they never left corpses._

_For what seemed an eternity, all was still. She stared at them, and they stared at her -- only at her. Oh,_ fuck, _what was this?_

_She didn't have time to wonder. The eldest boy screamed, an earsplitting shriek that echoed off the empty buildings and hammered straight into her brain. It was a sound of horror, but also of intense grief, and he raced forward before she could stop him._

_"_ Andrea! _" He was pelting toward a teenage girl, a tall girl with curly hair who looked so like him she had to be his missing sister._

 _"Dammit kid,_ don't _\--" She reached for him, but he was too fast, careening into his sister and trying to pull her into a desperate hug._

_It happened before Sharley could react. The girl cocked her head to one side, then yanked her brother's head back and tore his throat out._

_He screamed, or tried to: all he managed to do was choke on his own blood as it sprayed a fine mist over the Memories nearest him. The other children more than made up for it, shrieking and clinging to Sharley as though she could do anything to protect them. Nauseatingly bright red wicked down the boy's cotton shirt, and when his sister lifted him by his ruined throat his feet did a twitching Saint Vitus dance in the air._

_The others fell on him, clawing, tearing, giving Sharley the tiniest of opportunities. Fuck not running -- she shoved the rest of the children in front of her, and they took off through the thin gap in the murderous crowd. She was operating on pure instinct now, all rational thought shut down as a positively inhuman survivalist woke within her brain. Shit, shit, that was not what she needed right now, not when she wasn't alone, and she fought it with what little energy she had to spare._

_"_ Go! _" she screamed, clutching Marty even closer, and they did, tearing off in a race that proved fatal for two more, snatched by the Memories in less than a blink._

_"Don't you dare stop for them, Sharley," Kurt snarled, but she didn't need the order. Once the Memories got someone, there was nothing to be done for them: you couldn't fight the Memories, couldn't hurt them or even slow them down. Those they caught were lost, period._

_Her lungs were burning as she ran, choked by the miasma unique to Old Echo, and her vision was going grey. What little cogent thought she had left was vanishing fast -- until searing pain snapped her horribly back to reality. One of them had caught her, slashing down her back with nails like claws, and she was dimly aware of the wet soaking her tattered shirt. Now the copper-hot stench of her own blood joined that of the dead and dying, and she gagged, fighting the bile that rose and burned in her throat._

_Someone was screaming, and it wasn't her. It was Marty, crying as she hadn't done since she was a colicky baby, and oh Christ, her hair was wet, red spreading through the blond strands like dye --_

_It was there her consciousness snapped, everything that made her_ Sharley _subsumed by the other half, the Stranger -- the leviathan that normally lurked in uneasy sleep at the back of her mind. It was the thing that fought to ensure her survival in time of need, but it didn't care what happened to anything around her. Sharley was not a killer: it was, and then some._

_How long it had control of her, she never knew. When awareness returned, she found herself just beyond the edge of the hellhole of Old Echo, surrounded by the few surviving children. Acrid dust had invaded her sinuses, stinging wherever it made contact with dozens of wounds she didn't remember receiving. The bittersweet salt of blood burned at the back of her throat, and when she tried to cough it out she wound up on her knees, dry-heaving onto the ruined asphalt._

_All around her the children were crying, but her brain only dimly registered it. Something else was wrong, some subtle thing her beleaguered mind tried to beat her into registering as she gripped Marty in an embrace almost crushing._

_Marty. Marty wasn't crying._

_Ice flooded Sharley's veins, a horrible counterpoint to the Other's dry heat. One hand reached up to stroke her daughter's hair and came away red and sticky, and she felt a scream rising with the blood in her throat. When she dared look down, she found Marty's face death-pallid and streaked with gore: her eyes, mismatched like her mother's, stared sightless through the tangled curtain of her bangs. And her throat --_

_Sharley did scream then, a cry of rage and unimaginable grief. No, no, no, no, they'd got out, dammit, even if she didn't remember…wait._

_Wait._

_"You," she hissed, forcing herself to her feet. Sheer blood loss had rendered her balance a tenuous thing, but the strength of her fury kept her upright. She cradled her dead daughter, whose body was already cooling. "You let her die. You let her die so you could get me out."_

_The Stranger didn't answer; unlike the voices, it never did. It wasn't dormant, though -- she could feel it stirring, still restless, but for now the magnitude of her wrath kept it caged._

_One of the children tugged on the tattered end of her shirt, and she shifted mental gears without realizing she did so._

_"You've gotta go, Sharley," Layla said quietly. "They're still alive._ You're _still alive."_

_Not for long, she thought, as she staggered forward. She might be tough as old shoe-leather, but she could feel the life draining out of her with so much blood, and she didn't care. Without Marty, nothing mattered. She'd get these kids to the safety of the Swamp, but it would be no haven for her._

_It wasn't the Stranger that dulled her thoughts this time: pure exhaustion overtook her, leaving her only dimly aware of the heat and blood and dust. Her unsteady feet made her weave like a drunk, and she fell more than once._

_Her last, lethal collapse happened at the very edge of the Swamp, and she didn't bother trying to get up again. The others would be safe here, if they followed the blue lanterns that marked the path. They glowed like stars in her darkening vision: the last thing her human eyes ever saw._

Erik actually staggered, back hitting the wall as his mind fought to reorient itself. Evidently the Stranger didn’t understand the concept of warning someone -- nor did Charles seem to believe in filtering anything he passed along. In a way, though, Erik was almost grateful for it: horrible as that had been, to have had the knowledge, without the intensity, would have been meaningless. That...that....

Something touched his hand, and he found Kitty looking at him. She handed him a wad of napkins, and he realized there were tears on his face. He was quite certain that his older self would share them, because he too had witnessed their mother’s death. It was a different pain than that of losing a child, but it hurt no less. For the first time, he was grateful her own death had been so swift, and likely painless. Certainly nothing like...like _that._

“That is what you face,” the Stranger said. “That is what we must leave tomorrow to confront.”

“ _Tomorrow?_ ” Clarice choked. “But...but...how the hell are they even in this world? How did they get through the _basement,_ for Christ’s sake?”

“That,” the Stranger said, “I do not yet know -- nor will I, until I’ve seen the place for myself. And every day we waste here is a day their hold grows stronger.”

It was a strange thing, but Erik was not half so terrified as he rationally ought to be, especially after seeing that. Maybe it was because he’d been having nightmares about that damn basement for the better part of a week anyway, or simply because his entire soul wanted to get this over and done with. What would come after, he didn’t know, nor did he particularly care. Getting through it was what mattered -- and he doubted he was alone in that mindset.

Kitty squeezed his hand, and he suspected that it was more than half for her own comfort. “I need a goddamn kitten,” she said, and didn’t bother keeping her voice down. 

“No shit,” Clarice muttered weakly. “I need a _drink._ ”

“Be careful with that,” Charles said. He looked perilously close to stricken, his face all but bloodless. “We’ll need our wits about us, if we really must leave tomorrow.”

Marie’s eyes, though tear-filled, were fixed on the Stranger with a hard stare. “You be careful with him,” she said. “When we’re down there, and I mean it. I promised I’d get him out in one piece, and I mean to keep it.”

The Stranger gave her what Erik suspected it thought of as a smile. It was not an expression he was ever likely to forget, though he’d try. “Once we are there, I will not need him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoo boy. I should probably mention at this point that the Stranger, the Memories, and the Other are all from a series of books I wrote and did nothing with -- partly because I’m rather daunted by the publishing process, and partly because I’m just lazy. The Stranger in this story is actually severely toned down from its canon self, because this is not a horror fic, and never will be. (Potential sequels, on the other hand....)


	29. The Last Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this was supposed to be the chapter where Rogue and Logan (temporarily minus the Stranger) started getting a little more, ahem, _intimate._ Unfortunately, I got in a massive email fight with my ex-husband this morning, so I’m not feeling particularly romantic ATM. At least there’s still cuddling? Honestly, it’s a good thing they haven’t made it to France yet: in the mood I’ve been in most of the day, somebody probably would have died horribly. It’s also a touch shorter than normal, because I really have been absolutely fucking furious.

The horror the Stranger showed them all sort of put a damper on the rest of the afternoon.

Rogue, Clarice, and Kitty went for a walk, and Clarice was pretty sure she wasn’t the only one who wanted to pretend they were just students, that none of the shit they’d gone through in the last decade had happened. 

It was sweltering, so they went to the pond, kicking their way through the shallows in a line, like that picture of the Beatles crossing Abbey Road. The only sound was a chorus of chirping crickets, and it was all so oppressive that Clarice thought she’d scream. Instead, she said, “Hey Rogue, did you ever kiss Logan?”

Rogue’s steps faltered, and Kitty actually ran right into her back. Rogue turned, and gave her a slightly disbelieving look, as if to say, _You’re asking this_ now?

“Well, did you?”

“I _can’t_ ,” Rogue said, wading her way to shore. “Poison skin, remember?”

“Yeah, but your mutation doesn’t kick in right away,” Kitty said, following, tripping a little over some underwater obstacle. “Plus, Logan’s got the healing thing going in his favor. Whenever the Stranger gives him back, you need to kiss him. Just in case we all die in that basement.”

Rogue rolled her eyes, but there was a pinkness to her face that wasn’t just sunburn. “We’re not gonna die down there.”

Clarice wasn’t so sure about that, but she knew better than to say anything. “Still. Just in case.”

“You do realize that we were all following the whole...you two...thing practically since you first came to the mansion, right?” Kitty said, barely dodging when Rogue threw a handful of moss at her. “I mean, we understood why it didn’t go anywhere while you were still a student, but seriously, it got to the point that we wanted to beat Logan over the head and tell him to stop thinking he was in love with Jean. He never looked at her the way he looks at you.”

“But he’s a guy, and guys are stupid,” Clarice said sagely, sitting on Rogue’s other side. “You trying to pretend to yourself that Bobby actually had a chance, though...seriously, Rogue. Really? I think the only person who didn’t see through that was Bobby himself.”

“Actually, I sort of think he did, too,” Kitty said, digging into the moss with her bare toes. “You were always just kind of...well, pretty obviously spoken for. I know you thought it was the poison skin, but trust me, you should have heard the, uh, creative solutions they came up with, for getting around it. Jubilee and I had to smack the shit out of a few. Nobody ever would have said anything to you about it, though, because Logan. Just...because Logan. His name was its own explanation.”

Rogue looked genuinely startled. Had she really had no damn idea just how many guys (and a few girls) had spent time figuring out ways to get her clothes off without actually dying? “Are you shittin’ me?”

“Nope,” Clarice said. “Bobby was just the only one crazy enough to actually _act_ on anything. And stupid enough to think he had a chance.”

Rogue winced. Clarice knew that she really had liked Bobby, just...not like that. He was kind, and because she couldn’t touch him, he was safe. But he was a placeholder, and everyone but the pair of them knew it. “Poor Bobby,” she said. After a small pause, she added, “Kitty, this is all water long since under the bridge, but were you and Bobby ever...?”

“No,” Kitty assured her, and Clarice knew she was telling the truth. “Look, I’ve never said this to anyone, because most people would probably think I was just weird, but I’ve never felt _that_ way about anybody, guy or girl.”

“What about Erik?” Rogue asked, and her tone wasn’t teasing -- she was genuinely curious.

Kitty rolled her eyes. “What is with you people about that? I do like him, even if a lot of the time I wonder _why_. Just not in any...I don’t know, normal relationship sense, but not in just a _friend_ sense, either. I’d heard it was possible to want to protect someone and murder them at the same time, but I never fully understood what that would be like until I got to know that asshole. I know I’d be seriously pissed if anybody else got interested in him, though.” 

“Goes both ways,” Clarice snickered. “Poor Janek’s terrified of him.”

“Is that -- well, that explains a few things. I thought the kid was terrified of me.”

“Nope,” Clarice laughed. “I guess it’s always been over your head, but every time that poor kid tries to get anywhere near you, Erik -- _God_ , it’s so weird to call him that -- glares at him like he wants to skin him alive.”

“Huh.” The fact that Kitty sounded flattered was...well, that was just wrong. And yet it summed the pair of them up in a nutshell.

“And I thought _my_ relationship was weird,” Rogue said, shredding some moss.

“Oh, don’t worry, it is,” Kitty assured her. “But yours is also sweet and wonderful and not completely creepy. If we weren’t trying to keep the whole ‘mutant’ thing undercover, your story would make an awesome movie. I don’t think many people in the world have what you do. It’s why we were all so invested in seeing how it played out.”

“Y’all are weird,” Rogue muttered, as if that was actually news to anyone. Again there was that faint blush, though Clarice suspected this one was also partially out of embarrassment. 

“ _Duh_ ,” Kitty said. “But seriously. Kiss him, just in case. So Clarice and I won’t worry.”

Rogue’s expression was so pained that Clarice burst out laughing before she could help it. “We’re all invested in you two, Rogue,” she said. “Accept it and move on.”

“Swear I’m gonna smother you both with kittens tonight,” Rogue growled. “Just you wait.”

“Do we even need to share a room anymore?” Clarice asked. “I mean, what with all the Professor’s done to our minds. I’m thinking you and Logan could maybe use some _alone time_ , if you can get the Stranger to loan him back for a while.”

Rogue’s blush deepened into something resembling the shade of a brick, and Kitty cackled. “I hate all y’all,” she muttered, covering her face with her hands.

Kitty nudged her with her right elbow. “You love us and you know it,” she said. “But seriously, explain your situation to the Stranger. It had that human half, maybe it’ll understand.”

Clarice wasn’t the only one that shivered. “I know our future was shitty,” she said, “but that Other place seems even worse. At least it’s actually possible to destroy a Sentinel.” She paused. “What do you think would happen if we pitted a Sentinel against a Memory?”

“If I could watch them duke it out in the Other, I’d pay to see it,” Kitty said. “It might take a while, but the Sentinel would get munched.”

“Speaking of munching, I’m starved,” Clarice said. She’d only had a single piece of bacon today, and her stomach was threatening to eat _itself_. “Let’s go see if there’s anything left in the kitchen.” Anathea and her crew would be just as hungry, so God knew just how much they would have gone through already.

“Sounds like a plan. And seriously, Rogue, if you don’t ask the Stranger, I will,” Kitty warned, hauling herself to her feet.

“I just bet you would,” Rogue muttered. “Fine, fine, I’ll do it. But if it doesn’t work, I’m blamin’ you.”

“I think I can handle that,” Kitty said, dry as burnt toast. “Guess we’ll know it worked if you don’t show up to the kitten room tonight.”

Rogue hurled another wad of moss at her.

\--

Hank had once again decided to try his hand at cooking, God help them all, so Erik grabbed several apples and retreated outdoors, sitting on the garden-wall a beside the porch. The kitchen was a sauna, and it already smelled like burned cheese, which was not an auspicious beginning. Ororo was attempting to supervise, but he still didn’t think it was going to end well.

Marie, Kitty, and Clarice came trouping across the lawn, giggling like loons. Marie’s face blushed so deeply that for a moment he was worried she was about to have a stroke, but no -- she was just extremely embarrassed. And here the three were (theoretically) friends.

Not that Erik had a great deal of experience with friendships -- certainly not enough to justify passing judgment. He’d had many _allies_ , but very few friends, and the best of them had wound up paralyzed because of him. He hadn’t yet asked either his elder self or the older Charles just why and how they’d managed to reconcile, and he wasn’t sure why he hesitated. After France -- assuming any of them even survived -- he’d make himself inquire. He might not _need_ friends, but after the last week of watching everyone else, he’d decided that he might like a few. Maybe. Someday.

“I mean it,” Marie said, stomping past and into the kitchen, trying desperately to contain her giggling and failing miserably. “Hatred. All y’all.”

“ _I_ mean it,” Kitty countered. “If you don’t ask, I will.” 

Marie rolled her eyes. “I know, I know. Gimme a bit.”

“You’ve got till sundown,” Kitty warned. “After that....”

Marie flipped her off, before disappearing from view. Clarice, choking on her own laughter, followed.

“I realize I might regret this question,” Erik said, “but you are you asking what, and why?”

Kitty snickered. “It won’t fully make sense to you,” she said, sitting beside him, “since you don’t have all the time and emotional investment in it. Told her if she didn’t ask the Stranger to give Logan back for the night, I’d do it. The two of them have a little tension to work out.”

Now it was Erik who rolled his eyes. “And here I thought you were older than you looked.”

“Told you you wouldn’t get it,” Kitty said, stealing an apple. “We’ve all been following them for over a decade now. Seriously, sometimes it was tempting to bash some heads together, except whoever did it would get shanked. I know this sounds really weird, but they’re so sweet it’s almost nauseating sometimes.”

It did, in fact, sound really weird. Erik couldn’t put ‘sweet’ and ‘Logan’ in the same sentence. He just...couldn’t do it. “I’ll take your word for it. So long as they aren’t too tired to function tomorrow, or unable to actually walk, I don’t particularly care.”

She choked on a bit of apple. “Thanks for that,” she coughed. "I like them --" _hack_ “-- both, but that --” _wheeze_ “-- is not a mental --” _hack, wheeze_ “-- image I need.”

“You’re welcome. Are you actually going to eat that, or just choke to death on it?” he asked, thumping her on the back and trying to grab the apple.

“Hush, you.” She managed to spit out the offending chunk, though her eyes were watering. “Hey, did you have nightmares last night?” she asked, seemingly out of nowhere. “I mean, this morning. Whatever.”

“A few,” he said, not wanting to go into any details. “Not like the other nights.” He flatly refused to admit that it wasn’t just _her_ nightmares that driven him close enough to breathe right down her neck. Wasn’t going to happen.

The look she gave him was a little more shrewd than he liked, despite the fact that she was still coughing. Occasional evidence to the contrary notwithstanding, she was not, unfortunately, a stupid person. “Right,” she said, coughing and spitting again. “So you’ll be just fine sleeping on your own tonight, huh?”

For a brief moment, Erik entertained the idea of actually strangling her. It was possibly only her slightly evil little half-grin that stopped him. “Would you actually allow me to keep any of the kittens to myself, if I did?”

“Nope. Guess you’re still stuck with company.”

“Whatever will I do.”

Her half-grin gave way to a full-blown laugh. “Go the fuck to sleep, of course.”

\--

_The Stranger knew what the woman, Marie, would ask of it. Since it had nothing left to do until they left tomorrow, there was no reason keep hold of Logan. The complexities of human relationships escaped it, and always had -- in that, it was in full accord with the Other Half, and she had once been technically human -- but it understood that they were important. Marie could have her Logan, and the Stranger could examine the others without their knowing._

_It had seen many humans in its travels, but still they confounded it. Some, like these, had mutations; others had a kind of magic with similar results, and a great number had nothing like either. Some were vicious; some were kind; some flaunted their strength like a flag, while others held it close, showing no sign of it until whatever they chose to to loose it on had no time to defend against it. They were a strange, chaotic, species, so very mortal and fragile, cramming as much into their short lives as they possibly could._

_The elder telepath held a kind of wisdom the Stranger suspected humans rarely attained. It had dealt with telepaths before, but neither were like this man, who wrapped himself in serenity as though it were a blanket. The younger one, another iteration of himself, had not yet reached anything approaching that level of calm power, but he was on his way. If he survived this, he might reach it all the sooner._

_The metal-manipulator -- an ability the Stranger had never before seen -- was a strange creature, both the elder and the younger. The elder radiated grief and regret like an aura, wounded to his soul by his own decisions. The younger was lost, unable or unwilling to look to any future beyond France, beyond the tiny strange woman and all those kittens (though he would not admit either)._

_The storm-woman, strong though she was, was worried -- which also meant that she was smart. She and the woman with the portals would look after the others, whether they wanted looking after or not. The Stranger would need those portals, and wished it had found someone capable of casting them long before. The tiny woman’s ability to rip out organs was less useful in this context, but it could use her for something._

_The others, the other travelers from the future...most of them would be useless -- dead weight that might need to be sacrificed. It couldn’t let the Memories have them, but neither could it be bothered to spare much effort to keep them alive. Anathea alone had any real value, and she didn’t know it yet. Nor would she, until it was too late for her to run._

\--

It took Marie quite a while to find Logan-the-Stranger, and when she did, the Stranger was already absent. It was only Logan who sat in the huge living-room, staring out the window at the bloody sunset.

“I was gonna tell that thing to leave you alone, but now I guess I don’t have to,” she said, joining him on the couch. She gave him a crooked grin. “Kitty and Clarice basically told me I have to drag you upstairs and have my way without, however the hell we’re supposed to do that. I’m thinkin’ we’re gonna want our wits about us tomorrow, so I’d rather save it for after we’re done, and actually have some time, if you take my meanin’.”

His flabbergasted expression almost made her fall off the sofa laughing. “What, you think I haven’t thought of it?” she asked. “Or did you just expect me to still be coy? Come on, sugar, you know me better than that. Think we’re both long past coyness.”

His laughter warmed her. “Darlin’, I’ve been thinkin’ about that since you were nineteen years old,” he said. “I always seemed to have some excuse, though, why not.” He pulled her close, letting her rest her head on his chest. “Once we’re back, though -- once you’re ready -- I’ll show you every damn bit of creativity I’ve come up with in the last fifteen years. Get some money outta the Professor, and expose you to the amazin’ world of textiles.”

“Textiles?” she asked, craning her neck to look up at him.

“You’d be surprised what you can do, with different kinds of fabric,” he said, a little smugly. “I’ve got my plans, so you’d best make yours. Once we get back, I plan on keepin’ you in my bed as long as you’re willin’ to stay.”

“Careful, sugar,” she said, trying not to blush. “You might regret that invitation. I’ve got a lotta years of repression to burn off.”

“Yeah, that sounds about like my every goddamn dream come true,” Logan said, giving her a smirk that was one part mischief and and nine parts sin. “Gives me all the more reason to make sure my sorry ass gets out of that basement alive.”

“ _I’ll_ make sure of that,” Marie retorted. “Trust me, no Memory’s gettin’ anywhere near you, if I have anythin’ to say about it. And I’ve got plenty.”

She wasn’t worried about the others; she trusted they could all take care of themselves. Not that she was precisely _worried_ about Logan, since he was, well, _Logan_ , but still. He was her responsibility, whether he liked it or not. Fortunately, he didn’t seem to mind: there was no macho bullshit, but there also wasn’t any condescension, any sense that he was merely humoring her belief that she could protect him. He knew how dangerous she was.

Somehow, with him right here, she found herself excited for tomorrow, rather than afraid. Adrenaline fizzed in her blood, to such a degree that she wondered just how the hell she was to sleep tonight -- but she _had_ to sleep. They all did, which meant she might need to make a huge batch of her granny’s alcoholic sleep aide. 

“Just wanna get this over with,” she said, crawling onto his lap and resting her head under his chin. He wrapped his arms around her, and let out a hum of what she took to be agreement.

“It’ll be fine,” he said. “It’s us. We’re all good at survivin’.”

They were. She just hoped it would be enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up, we take our trip back to France. God help the French.


	30. One More Dawn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Marie is given something she’s not sure she can handle, the elder Charles is worried, young Erik is (unsurprisingly) a ruthless fucker, and they are off to Neverla-- er, Paris.

Almost nobody slept well that night, and not just because most of them had napped much of the day away.

Clarice did, but that was largely because she’d had no sleep at all the night before. Marie’s so-called sleep aide had little effect on everyone else, however. Charles had known that he would get no rest that night, but it troubled him that it took so long for the others to drop off. Even his younger self stared at the ceiling well until the small hours of the morning.

Ororo, unsurprisingly, was planning, mentally reviewing all the Stranger had showed them about the Memories. She had a kitten on her lap, and she stroked it absently while she thought. Marie slept more or less soundly beside Logan, his arm wrapped around her, holding her close in spite of the heat. He himself did little more than doze, however, listening to the night-sounds and wondering, if only at the very back of his mind, if it was the last time he would ever hear them. There were other thoughts as well, those slightly more...personal...so Charles left them well enough alone. Some things he simply did not need to know.

Elder Erik dozed as well, unable to truly drop off without jerking awake. Charles was worried about him, and had been ever since they arrived at the mansion. It must be far more difficult for him, facing his younger self: no matter what path the young Erik might be on now, his older self would never lose the memory of the terrible choices he’d made, most of which had been set in motion after that fateful day on the beach. 

For both of them, seeing all the changes wrought by this self-described pack of lunatics was...bizarre. Charles was not surprised that Logan had snapped his younger self out of his despair, but it was the madhouse around him that truly dragged him back into reality. He couldn’t have shut himself away even if he’d wanted to, not with his current cast of housemates. They irritated him, but they also fascinated him, every last one -- even Alfred, though he bore the man no good will. He’d been reminded that the world was a strange, huge, wonderful thing, that should not (could not) be ignored. It was very different from his elder self’s awakening, yet probably the better for it.

For Erik, on the other hand, it was somewhat bittersweet. His younger self would not make the same mistakes, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t make a whole host of new ones. At this age, calling him ‘troubled’ was a vast understatement, and while his time in this odd company had helped, it was by no means a complete recovery -- and possibly never would be. He’d seen much darkness in his life, and he was only going to see more -- literally -- very soon. 

Younger Erik slept, but uneasily, dipping in and out of nightmare. Each time he twitched he woke Kitty, who would reach out, grab a kitten, and stick it on his chest until he stopped moving. _That_ was an extremely odd pair, but it worked: Erik would spurn sympathy, deriding and dismissing it as nothing more than pity. While Kitty did have sympathy within her, it was wrapped in bluntness and mild, harmless antagonism, and was thus something he actually paid attention to (even if he would rather not admit it).

Anathea sat wide awake, guarding her charges. She was the youngest of all of them, yet she considered herself their protector, and he hoped she wouldn’t get herself killed over it. She guarded them too zealously, as though they were her children, not her companions. They would need to guard Alfred and his heart, and hope that the damned organ could be put back where it belonged, once everything was over.

Tomorrow. One way or the other, it would be over tomorrow.

\--

_Marie dreamed._

_This time it was not of her granny, though the dream itself was just as sharp and vivid as all those in which her grandmother had visited her. She stood now in the Other, beneath that harsh red sky, the metallic air stinging the back of her throat._

_This wasn’t Old Echo, thank God. Instead she found herself faced with the beginnings of a swamp, skeletal trees the size of towers reaching skyward, their branches festooned with moss and creepers. Birds called within, and insects whirred and chittered, but the air was utterly still. Behind her was a field, tall grass parched and dead -- and in it stood a woman, watching her._

_She was very tall, this woman -- probably nearly as tall as Logan -- and pale as a corpse. The skin of her arms and throat was crisscrossed with old scars, and she had a thin one running the entire length of the left side of her face. Her eyes were odd: the right was so dark it was nearly black, with a chunk of reddish brown, and the left was an uneven pinwheel of green and blue. Her hair was dyed a vivid cobalt blue, which only made her look even more unnatural, and her age was impossible to guess -- she could have been anywhere from twenty-five to forty._

_“Marie,” she said, and her voice was very familiar._

_“Sharley?” Marie hazarded. “The Stranger’s other half?”_

_The woman snorted. “Wish it wouldn’t call me that,” she said. “Yeah, that’s me, and I need to give you some help. Something you gotta have before you head out to deal with the Memories. I’d go with you if I could, but I can’t, so I’m gonna pass this on to you and hope it doesn’t drive you insane.”_

_Because_ that _was encouraging. “Why me?”_

_“You’re the only one that can take it from me. Although I apologize in advance for the shit you’re gonna get out of my head.” She took a step forward, and for some reason, Marie tensed. There was something so very, very_ wrong _about this woman -- Marie didn’t feel any sense of evil around her, but there was something so gratingly unnatural about her presence that the thought of her any closer was too disturbing for words._

_Sharley rolled her eyes -- an action that made her seem, for a moment at least, much more human. “I’m not gonna eat you, kid,” she said. “Although I oughtta warn you, most people don’t like me touchin’ ’em.”_

_Marie looked down at her bare hands. “I hurt people, when I touch them,” she protested. “Shit, hang on too long and I can kill them.”_

_Sharley snorted. “Kid, I’m long past bein’ able to be hurt by anythin’. Now give me your hand.”_

_Marie did, shivering with trepidation. When Sharley took it, it was all Marie could do not to stagger away in total revulsion._

_The woman’s touch was damn near frigid, the scars on her fingers creating strange ridges. It was like hanging onto a corpse -- oh Christ, had she given her hand to a zombie?_

_Sharley laughed, very quietly. “Not a zombie, kid. Clear your head.”_

_Like that was any kind of easy task. Her skin was damn near crawling, so much so that for a few moments she was unaware of the pull of her mutation. Which meant that when it did hit her, it was like being run over by a semi._

_There was memory, yes, jumbled and confused, but mostly there was_ power _\-- shockingly intense, totally alien, and almost unendurable._

_Sharley released her hand, catching her as she fell to her knees. Oh_ God _, what had she_ taken? _What had she_ done? _It jagged through her veins like lightning, searing itself into her very soul, and she had to shut her eyes against the sheer immensity of it._

_“Easy, kid. You’ll get used to it. I only gave you as much as a human could handle. Open your eyes.”_

_She didn’t want to, but she did it anyway. Sharley was there, but not_ only _Sharley -- superimposed over her, like a series of ghosts, were a younger woman with her eyes, but dark hair, a teenager whose tanned face was unmarred by scars, and a little girl with messy hair and a too-large T-shirt._

_“Look around,” Sharley ordered, and something in her voice compelled Marie to obey._

_She saw the Other, the dying wasteland of a world. There were trees at the other end of the field, fir trees that were brown and long dead -- except they were not only that. Again there were the ghost-images, dozens of them: the forest alive and green, the sky a brilliant blue over golden-green grass that whispered as a light breeze stirred it like some invisible finger._

_“What in the hell did you_ do _to me?” Marie asked, barely able to get the words out._

_“Time,” Sharley said gently. “I gave you Time. You can see it, but you can manipulate it, if you have to. You’re gonna want it, in that basement. The thing is, kid, nothin’ mortal survives the Memories without a lot of help. Never has, and probably never will. Now, the Stranger_ knows _that, but it won’t want to admit it. It’ll think that it’s enough, but it’s an idiot and always has been. You use what I gave you, and you’ll get through this fine.”_

_“Can’t you help us?” Marie asked, ashamed of how plaintive she sounded._

_Sharley shook her head. “I can’t go into your world,” she said. “I can’t possess people like the Stranger does, and your dimension could handle most of the things that live in the Other. We’d rip it apart just by bein’ there. You’ve got everythin’ you need, to be able to do what I do. Now go on and get some real sleep, while you still can.”_

\--

Logan was getting worried. He couldn’t wake Marie up.

She wasn’t comatose or anything -- she was very obviously dreaming, twitching and occasionally muttering, though she said nothing coherent. He was just about to go get the Professor when her eyes opened, and she froze.

“Stay still, sugar,” she said. “Just gimme a minute.”

He had no idea why she’d ask that of him, but he did it anyway, watching her carefully. She smelled...weird, much as she had when she’d been possessed by the Stranger. It wasn’t quite the same, however -- the scent of lightning was still there, but the harsh, metallic element was absent, and there was something else, something he couldn’t identify. It was very rare, that he encountered a truly new smell, but this aroma was totally alien.

“Marie?” he asked, after a long pause. “Darlin’, what’s goin’ on?” She still hadn’t even blinked, and it was severely creeping him out.

“Got given somethin’,” she said, still staring. “Tryin’ to figure out how to get used to it. The other one -- the one the Stranger calls its other half -- I met her, just now, and she gave me a little of whatever it is she does. Whatever she is. It’s not like anythin’ else I’ve ever grabbed, but she says I can use it.”

She fell silent, but at least she finally blinked. Her eyes traced over his face with rapt fascination, before traveling to their surroundings. “Goddamn, this is weird. No wonder she said she hoped it wouldn’t drive me insane.”

Well, that was just a tad ominous. “I think you need to see the Professor,” he said, but she held out a hand, forestalling him.

“Not just yet. Like I said, I gotta get used to it -- and to havin’ her memories rattlin’ around in my head. If the Professor joined in right now, I’m not sure _what_ would happen, and I don’t wanna find out.”

He wanted to argue. He really, really did, but Marie knew herself, and knew what she could handle. “You want me to make you some coffee?” he asked instead. Dawn was on its way, and he doubted either one of them would be able to go back to sleep now.

“I’d appreciate it, sugar,” she said, though he wasn’t sure if it was just because she wanted coffee, or because she needed a little time alone. Either way, he’d give it to her.

At this early hour, nobody was up and about. It meant he could make the coffee in peace, and cook up some breakfast. He wasn’t sure whether or not Marie would be hungry, but he sure as hell was, and he had to make her eat something sooner or later. Maybe he’d slap together a bunch of sandwiches for the flight, since they were all going to be stuck sitting in that sardine can for six hours.

Christ, look at him. Maybe Kitty was right -- maybe he really _had_ been domesticated. Strangely, he couldn’t bring himself to care very much. Marie was worth it.

He thought about what she’d said last night -- about wanting to get physical. It made him even more determined to get this shit over and done with, because god _damn_ had he spent way too much time waiting for her to say that. He’d have stayed with her the rest of her life no matter what, but hearing those words out of her mouth was like every Christmas morning rolled into one. He just needed to find a shitload of silk and velvet before then, and wasn’t quite sure just how to go about buying either. Maybe the Professor knew of a fabric store, or something.

Ororo joined him, silent and sleepy, a kitten sitting on her shoulder like a fucking parrot. She poured herself come coffee and vanished outside without a sound, her passage like a ghost. He hoped the rest of them weren’t going to follow before he was through, because there was no way in hell he was cooking breakfast for _everybody_. Might make the Professor some later, when he went to ask about looking in on Marie. The rest of them cold damn well fend for themselves.

\--

Erik hadn’t slept at all well, but he still felt rested when he finally woke up. There was a kitten draped over his neck like a scarf, another curled around the crown of his head, and a human Kitty plastered against his side, dead to the world. He couldn’t say he minded.

He was not the sort of person who would willingly tolerate contact from...well, anybody. But, despite the fact that he knew full well Kitty could very easily _kill him_ , he didn’t mind it from her. Her ability to murder him did not mean she was automatically a threat, and for some bizarre reason, he trusted her. Sure, he occasionally wanted to strangle her, but he still trusted her. He was quite certain she’d never lied to him -- mostly because he didn’t think she was capable of actually pulling off a lie -- and while she gave him endless amounts of shit, she didn’t see him as any kind of monster. He was still not sure he could say that about the others, no matter what they might say themselves. 

It was highly unlikely he’d ever actually be _attracted_ to her, because no matter what age he knew her to be, she still looked like she was about fourteen. That was probably for the best, though -- his track record with actual relationships was not what one might call stellar. Kitty was...Kitty. As far as he was concerned, that was the only explanation necessary. And, though she’d never said anything, he suspected they had a mutual understanding. She wouldn’t have stayed so close last night if they didn’t. 

So. There was that. 

Somehow, he managed to shift both kittens and get up without waking her, though of course he sneezed as soon as he reached the bathroom. The collar of his shirt was absolutely coated in cat fuzz, which had to be a major contributing factor. And they were taking the entire load of furballs with them on the plane? That was going to be ever so much fun. Except for the part where it wouldn’t.

He had to feed the little monsters before they would allow him out the door, and he he had to go find a spare shower and a spare shirt. He wasn’t yet ready to deal with the lunacy, assuming any of the lunatics were up at this hour. It wouldn’t surprise him if they were, considering that for all they knew, this might be their last day on Earth. 

The others, the ones who hadn’t been down there...they didn’t understand. They couldn’t. He would imagine that Hank and Clarice were far less optimistic than the rest. Logan was such a stubborn bastard that he probably wouldn’t even entertain the idea of failure, but the three of them...Erik didn’t care what the Stranger said, what it claimed it could do. All he knew was that he intended to bring whatever metal he could carry without notice, just in case. He didn’t think Kitty needed any warning to stay intangible as long as she could, so he wouldn’t bother informing her of his intentions.

He didn’t want to kill the others. If there was any way at all of avoiding it, he’d take it. But if it came down to the wire -- if things went enough to hell that all his projectiles became necessary -- well. He couldn’t afford to be _too_ careful. Not if it might cost him or Kitty their heads.

\--

Charles appreciated the breakfast Logan brought him. He was also unsurprised by the man’s request.

He’d felt it, whatever _it_ actually was -- the strange, unnatural intrusion into his home, into the sleeping mind of one of its occupants. Truthfully, he had no idea if he could tell either of them much of anything about it, and that Marie probably knew everything there was to be said already. Whatever it was, it hadn’t hurt her: while he sensed her confusion, she was in no pain, and she wasn’t afraid. He had to take both of those as good signs.

She was up, showered, and dressed by the time he and Logan arrived -- to all appearances, she seemed almost normal. The only truly odd thing was that she kept shutting her eyes, even as she greeted them both.

“Mornin’, Professor. Logan, can I have those eggs before I fall down and die outta starvation?” She sat on the couch, opening her eyes long enough to take the plate from him, as well as a steaming mug of coffee. “Suppose Logan dragged you here to see what’s goin’ in on my head, huh?” 

“He was rather concerned, yes,” Charles said, watching her closely. She opened her eyes again, and watched him in turn, even more intently. “He said you’d been given something in your sleep.”

“I was,” she said, her gaze darting over him and all the things around him. “Weird as hell, but useful, if I can wrap my brain around it. Stranger’s other half passed me a little of her ability, so I could use it in the basement. I just have to get a handle on the side effects.”

“What side effects?” he asked, fascinated in spite of himself. “What is it you see?”

“You,” she said, taking a long swig of coffee. “You as a baby, and a kid. When you got your degree, and when you were near Cuba and all that shit went down. Whatever I look at, it’s like I see -- not just everything that was, but some things that might be. There’s -- there’s these images, these sort of ghost-layers, and one of ’em of you is very old. You’ve got a big scar on your face, right here.” She drew a line down the left side of her face, still staring. He noted that she hadn’t yet blinked.

“What happened, Marie? How were you given this?”

The story she told him was bizarre, but not much more so than anything else that had happened in the last two days. Logan looked somewhat unhappy that she’d been saddled with this, but Marie herself didn’t seem to mind. There was an odd, almost inhuman air of stillness about her, that she somehow managed to maintain even when she moved. What else had she taken from this Sharley woman? What consequences would there be, from receiving an ability from a creature that was neither human nor mutant?

They didn’t have time to think much about it right now, but he worried a little. When they returned from France, he wanted to have as detailed a look into her mind as she would allow.

“I need to look at the basement, before we go in,” she said. “I think I might be able to see some of the ways this might go, you know? Some of possible endin’s. If we know what _could_ happen, maybe we could stop it from happenin’.”

“It’s definitely possible,” he agreed. What he really worried about was sending her down in there. If she could in fact see past events somehow superimposed upon the present...well, she’d be able to see the history of the place. She wouldn’t just know what had happened, she would witness it. And from all Charles had heard of what went on in that basement, he wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

But Marie was no fool. She would have realized that herself already. She wouldn’t let it stop her, simply because she -- they -- couldn’t afford to.

“Do you need any assistance in caging Sharley?” he asked, relatively certain it was the only aid he could give, for now.

Marie shook her head. “It’s not quite like with the others,” she said. “I’ve got some of her memories, but there’s no actual _her_ in my head that’d need lockin’ up. Which is a relief, because I dunno if I could have handled that, on top of everythin’ else.” She shuddered. “Wish I could say what the Stranger showed us was the worst memory that poor woman’s got, but it isn’t. Wouldn’t trade place with her for anythin’.”

“We’re in for our own shit,” Logan said. “No sense dwellin’ on anybody else’s. There anythin’ special we oughtta bring?” he added.

“Just yourselves. I have a feeling conventional weaponry might well be useless in this situation.”

“Just the same, I never thought I’d wish for all that damn adamantium,” Logan muttered. “Marie, I’m givin’ you a little of my healin’ factor before we leave. I’ll recover by the time we get there.”

Marie opened her mouth, but seemed to realize there was no point in arguing. Instead she sighed, and finished her coffee.

“I’d like to look in on the others,” Charles said. “Get some relaxation, while you still can.”

\--

Now that it came down to it, Clarice was scared shitless. Oh, she knew she wouldn’t be going down into that darkness alone, that this wasn’t going to be one of her nightmares, but still. One trip into that basement was more than enough, thank you very much.

She didn’t say anything, because there wasn’t really much point. The others probably felt the same way, to one degree or another, but she doubted they’d admit it. Anathea had taken some coffee and fled outside, and the rest of her crew were nowhere to be seen. Neither were Hank and Raven, and Clarice dreaded what they might be creating in the infirmary as a ‘weapon’.

Clarice herself went to the kitten-room, needing to sit with something cute and fuzzy if she wasn’t to die of nerves. She herself had fallen asleep on the couch the night -- evening -- before, and had missed out on any small, furry companions. Kitty, it would appear, had not: she was currently providing a bed/perch for four of the little things, who were shedding assiduously all over her clothes. Clarice only wished she could sleep so soundly.

She picked up a kitten, even as another tried to climb her hair. They were, she thought, her main reason for wanting to just deal with this, no matter how afraid she was: once they were done, once they were safely outside the basement again, she could look after this little batch of furballs. She planned to do that -- and nothing more than that -- for as long as it took to get over the nightmares. Let the others do what they wanted -- which, in Logan and Rogue’s case, was probably each other -- but she’d keep the kittens, goddammit.

Kitty stirred, causing her furry little companions to squeak and flee. When she opened her eyes, she gave Clarice a tired smirk. “I can’t be the only one who wants to get shitfaced before we go in,” she said, and stretched, only to wince and put a hand on her ribs again. Clarice hoped like hell that wouldn’t be a liability for her, down in the dark. 

In the dark. Christ, maybe none of them would ever be able to sleep without a light on, for the rest of their damn lives. “You’re not,” Clarice said, a little too fervently. “Trust me. I’d rather just bomb the entire house and be done with it.”

Kitty laughed, though there wasn’t a whole lot of humor in it. “Nuke the site from orbit?” she asked. “It’s the only way to be sure.”

Clarice snorted, and sneezed right on her kitten’s head. It gave her what could only be called a glare, and attacked her shirt. “From orbit’ is right. Don’t want to get any closer than that.”

Kitty sat up, grabbing a kitten when it tried to chew on her hair. “You know what? It’s a long-ass flight to Paris. We can have a couple breakfast cocktails and still be sober by the time we get there. Just no Vlad the Inebriator.”

“He can come back out of the closet when we get home,” Clarice agreed. “I say we hit the liquor cabinet before anybody notices. Though you ought to have some toast or something first.”

“Square deal. Meet you back here in fifteen.” Kitty hobbled right through the wall, and Clarice shook her head. Might a well enjoy what could be their last morning on Earth.

\--

Logan-the-Stranger summoned them all to the kitchen at eight.

Ororo was as calm as she possibly could be in such a situation, but it looked like she was one of a select few. The Professor -- her Professor -- seemed serene, and Magneto was, as ever, very difficult to read. His younger self was not: he seemed to vacillate between silent anger, carefully-repressed terror, and a strange calculation that she didn’t like at all.

Anathea and her crew all looked like they were about to be sick, Hank practically radiated nervousness, and Raven wore an expression of grim determination. Clarice and Kitty, unfortunately, seemed to have broken into the liquor cabinet -- while neither was exactly drunk, they were somewhat obviously tipsy. All Ororo could do was sigh, because, quite honestly, she couldn’t exactly blame them.

And then there was Marie, who seemed to have forgotten how to blink. Her eyes were darting around the room with a very strange sort of interest, as though she’d never seen any of it before. Ororo looked at the Professor, who didn’t seem at all concerned by it, so she let the matter lie. If he thought it was a problem, he’d say something.

“We must leave now. All of us.” It was all Logan-the-Stranger said, but it was all that was really necessary. 

She’d wondered how they were all to get to the airport, but evidently the young Professor had once again called for a bus. By all rights, they should have boarded it like prisoners going to their deaths, but it turned out to be far more chaotic: while Anathea and her people got on quietly, Kitty and Clarice were loud enough as they followed, manhandling the crate of kittens, none of whom sounded happy. The elder Professor’s chair ascended easily, but Ororo helped the younger get his wheelchair secured. 

Hank and Raven trudged in, the former carrying a huge paper bag that smelled like salami -- lunch, maybe? Between them lay a drugged Alfred, who had to be resting on something metal, because the younger Magneto was bearing him along in midair. The elder Magneto carried the jar with the heart, and Ororo had to look away from it.

Marie and Logan-the-Stranger came last, and Ororo couldn’t decide which one unnerved her more. She noted that they stayed near one another, but she wasn’t certain why: Logan was obviously not himself. Marie’s proximity didn’t seem to be anything as simple as protective instinct, either, and Ororo suspected it had something to do with the Stranger. She hoped that, whenever this actually managed to be over, it and everything connected to it would vanish back into its own hell-dimension.

_Off to Never-Never Land,_ she thought, as Hank took the driver’s seat. 

\--

By the time they reached the airport, Kitty was feeling unfortunately sober.

She and Clarice got the kittens on board before anyone else even had a chance, securing it in on the floor of the cockpit beside the co-pilot’s seat. The poor things were not happy, and weren’t at all shy about letting anyone know it: that was an impressive amount of squeaking. Kitty lurked near them until the others got on board, abandoning her post only when the young Professor had to sit down. He really needed a floating chair, like his older self.

Navigating her way through the crowd was not fun, since the aisle was pretty much non-existent, but she managed to do it without breaking herself or anyone else. She fetched up next to Erik, who looked disturbingly thoughtful. Whatever was running through his head, she really didn’t want to know -- unless it involved killing Alfred, but that could wait. “Wake me up if we’re about to die, okay?” she said, before curling up into a ball and forcing herself to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For them, eight hours until showtime! Of course, they’re not going to get there without problems, because it’s them. There’s still the slight problem of there having been _five_ people originally in that basement: we’re going to see the return of Trask.


	31. One More Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which they arrive in France, collect Trask, and discover that they are completely, utterly fucked. Again.

The flight was surprisingly quiet.

Once they were airborne, Clarice had released the kittens, who had crawled over all and sundry in their exploration of the plane. They were, Erik had to admit, a pretty effective distraction, if only because they flatly refused to be ignored. 

Kitty was not the only one who slept: out of Anathea’s group, she was the only one who remained awake. Clarice herself was dozing while a kitten chewed on the end of her braid. The rest seemed lost in thought, which at least made it peaceful. Too bad he had to interrupt it.

“You do realize we’re going to need Trask, right?” he asked, of the plane at large. “He was down there with us, too.”

“I know,” Charles -- the younger Charles -- said. “I’ve made some arrangements.”

Erik supposed he shouldn’t be startled that Charles could have that level of connections. “Oh?”

Charles sighed. “He’s been having the same nightmares as the rest of you. He voluntarily admitted himself for psychiatric treatment in Paris three days after his...escape. He’ll be made available for collection when we arrive.”

Hank groaned. “How the hell are we going to hide the fact that we’re mutants, once we’re down in that damn basement?”

Erik had a few ideas. He was quite sure nobody but his elder self and Raven would possibly appreciate them, since they all involved leaving the little bastard in the basement. Permanently. He didn’t dare outright murder Trask -- the chances of one or both Charleses finding out was too great -- but neither was he going to take any care to make sure the asshole survived.

“I can alter his memory, if I have to,” the older Charles said. He didn’t sound particularly happy about the idea. “He need not remember he ever left the psychiatric facility.”

Erik still thought they should kill the fucker. But maybe that was just him.

Kitty must have woken up, though she hadn’t actually opened her eyes. She said, “Professor, you can give him someone else’s memories, right?”

“I can, if I need to,” he said. “Why?”

“There was this thing on YouTube once -- hey Clarice, you remember that video of goats yelling like people, right?”

“I tried to forget that,” Clarice grumbled. “Really, I did. What about it?”

“I want to use it. Professor, if I remember it in as much detail as I can, can you transfer it to Trask? Because with something that weird in his head, he won’t be thinking about mutants. Trust me.”

Clarice burst into a fit of uncontrollable giggling, scaring away the kitten on her hair. She let out the most ungodly noise, like someone punching a seal in the gut, which set Kitty off, too, laughing so hard she almost fell off her seat. Even Ororo laughed, though she tried to disguise it as a cough. Anathea just looked at them all like they’d completely lost their minds. You’d think she’d be used to them by now.

“Seriously, it’s too bad YouTube won’t be invented for another thirty years,” Kitty said. “It’s absolute gold. Though I guess we could reproduce it, sort of, once this is over. Travel around with a video camera and record yelling goats. Can we get some goats, when we get home?”

“Are you sure you aren’t drunk?” Erik asked.

“No, I just wish I was. Professor, could you do it?”

“I could,” he said, with a smile that threatened to turn into a laugh at any moment.

“It will take us a little longer to get there,” younger Charles said. “We have to land at Cormeilles-en-Vexin Airport. After what happened at Charles de Gaulle, I think they might just arrest us if we went back.”

That was, unfortunately, a very good point. It shouldn’t tack on too much more time, though, if he remembered his geography correctly.

“I ought to sue them for running me over with a fucking truck,” Kitty groused. “If, you know, I legally existed in 1973.”

“Pity I didn’t do anything to that driver. I could have used it to do something horrible to him,” Erik said, thoughtful.

Kitty winced. “Clarice, don’t --”

“-- That’s what she said.”

“God dammit, Clarice.”

“Well, this is going to be a wonderfully long flight,” his elder self said, to no one in particular.

“You have no idea,” Ororo sighed.

\--

Marie stared out the window, a kitten on her lap.

It was really, really weird, having someone else’s memories without actually having a copy of them in her head. It meant that everything she saw had no context nor meaning. Some of it was quite terrible, but some of it was also incredibly beautiful.

And most of it was extremely useful. She saw how Sharley used her power, how she manipulated Time within her own world. It took a great deal of concentration, but eventually Marie learned how to see the threads that connected all the ghost-images of history and potential future. She didn’t dare experiment while they were airborne, but she knew that what Sharley did actually _worked_ , so she’d see how well she could duplicate it once they were safely on land again.

Marie had touched far more mutants than she liked, willingly and unwillingly, but none of them -- not even Logan or Magneto -- had left her feeling so very, very _powerful_. She felt like she could make or break the entire damn world, if she really wanted to: her nerves were fizzing with alien energy, and under any other circumstances she’d be pacing up a storm, room or no room. But right now...the odd stillness was equally alien, but she welcomed it. Though she felt more awake and more alive than she ever had in her life, she wasn’t restless.

And eventually, it was going to fade. Somehow, that thought hurt her more than anything had since well before she went to the camps. It would fade, and she didn’t even have a Sharley in her head, to tell her how to deal with that loss.

_Oh, I’m here. I’m just keepin’ out of your way. Not much else I can do._

Marie twitched. _You can_ do _that?_

_I can rip Time apart. Hidin’ in your head is easy. I know you don’t want to lose this, but you’ve got to. If you hang onto it too long, it’ll burn you from the inside out._

_But...I feel like I’ve been asleep my entire life, and just now woken up. How can I give this up later?_

_You have to,_ Sharley said gently. _I sorta had the same thing happen, with somethin’ else. A very wise woman told me the price of borrowin’ such power is havin’ to give it back. You’re strong, Marie. You’ll adjust. By the standards of your world, you’re a lot like me -- there’s nothin’ else quite like you out there. It can be a shitty thing to have to live with, but you have friends, and you’re stronger than you know._

_Everybody keeps tellin’ me that,_ Marie sighed. _Kinda hate it_.

Sharley’s laughter filled her head. _It’s not fun, but it’s true. And once you_ do _know -- once you’ve seen just what it is you can really do -- it won’t seem so bad. It’ll scare the shit out of you at first, but you’ll be glad you learned it._

_I hope you’re right._

_About some things, I usually am. And this is one of ’em. Just do me one favor, will you? Pick some time when the Stranger’s not paying attention to much, and tell it I say hi. I want to see its reaction._

Marie sort of did, too. The thing still creeped her out, and all the more so because it had taken over Logan. _You’ve got a deal._

\--

By the time the flight was halfway through, Clarice had taught the kittens how to meow along to _The Wheels on the Bus go Round and Round,_ both sets of Eriks and Charleses had gone through several games of chess, and Ororo had flung an entire packet of croutons at Kitty. Kitty, she averred, should not be allowed to sleep again, given her tendency to phase through whatever she slept on: they didn’t need her falling right out of the plane.

“I haven’t done that since the first day we got here,” Kitty protested. “You just want revenge.”

“There’s that, too,” Ororo said blandly. “But seriously. Just because you haven’t done it in a few days doesn’t mean you won’t do it again, and knowing our luck, now would be the time you’d start hitting a losing streak. So stay awake.”

“There’s some Coca-Cola in the refrigerator, if you need caffeine,” the younger Professor said, helpfully.

“Thank God for that,” Kitty grumbled, headed for the fridge. Rather than try to dodge the forest of feet, she phased right through them, earning herself a chorus of protests and quite a bit of twitching. “Sorry,” she said, sounding anything but. 

“I really don’t want to know the mechanics behind that,” young Erik said, shuddering.

“No, you probably don’t,” she said, grabbing a bottle and prying the cap off with her teeth. Now it was Ororo who shuddered; she could only imagine what that would _do_ to her teeth. “Not that I know it myself. I don’t know that many of us ever tried to study the science of what we do.”

“No, we left that to Trask,” Raven said darkly. Ororo was quite certain she’d slit the bastard’s throat, if given half a chance. “I wish I’d destroyed all those records when I had a chance.”

“It’s not like we can’t do it later,” Clarice pointed out. “And they never did get your DNA. As long as Trask doesn’t see you in your natural form, he’ll never know what he’s missed out on.”

Raven rolled her eyes. Whenever she was around Anathea and the others, she’d maintained her human-looking disguise, dropping it only when she knew they wouldn’t turn up unexpectedly. It probably should be been a shock to learn that she was Mystique, but anymore, Ororo wasn’t sure there was a whole lot left in the world that could shock her. (The Memories might well be able to, but she didn’t count them as creatures of this world. Not remotely.)

Kitty yawned, and Ororo lobbed another crouton at her. She couldn’t be _too_ tired, because she was aware enough to let it phase right through her, bouncing off the young Charles’s head. Oops.

Young Erik sighed, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “And here I thought you were the mature one.”

There wasn’t any actual protest she could make -- not one that wouldn’t make her seem even more immature. “Fine,” she said. “ _You_ keep her awake.”

“That’s what she said,” Clarice said cheerfully, tickling a kitten with the end of her braid. 

Kitty rolled her eyes. “Are we there yet?”

“Not for another three hours,” Hank called, and Ororo was not the only one who groaned.

\--

By the time they finally landed -- which seemed to take far longer than three more hours -- even the elder Charles seemed eager to get off the plane. Kitty temporarily crated the kittens again, waiting for everyone to disembark to make sure their food and water bowls were filled. She opened the crate and phased right down through the floor, so there wasn’t any chance of one escaping through the open cabin door. 

Erik just shook his head. Evening was well on its way, and it would probably be fully dark by the time they reached the mansion. He didn’t relish the idea of dealing with that basement by night, but it wasn’t as though it would make much difference -- the evil would be no less potent by daylight.

At least this time they didn’t need to steal a shuttle. Charles’s ‘connections’ had come through there as well, allowing them to rent something far more comfortable than their last, pilfered vehicle.

“Trask will be sedated when we pick him up,” Charles said. “He should simply sit quietly until we reach the house, though we may need to give him another dose of sedative when we arrive. We will all have to watch him in the basement, to make certain that whatever lives down there doesn’t kill him because he’s incapacitated.”

“Do we have to?” Clarice muttered, trying to brush the kitten fur off her shirt. She had some in her hair as well, which looked quite ridiculous, but Erik wasn’t going to point it out.

“Yes, Clarice, we do. If we don’t return him to the facility alive, there will be questions we can’t answer.”

Damn. That was a very good point. Charles could wipe minds, but he couldn’t expunge paperwork -- even if he used the staff to do it themselves, there was always a chance they would miss something. Someone as high-profile as Trask probably couldn’t just disappear.

Erik glanced at Alfred, who was also deeply sedated. How that could even _work_ , he wasn’t sure, considering the bastard had no heart to circulate blood -- but then, he’d survived having it ripped out in the first place. Normal logic did not necessarily apply here.

_Maybe we can use him as a human sacrifice._ The thought cheered Erik up immensely. He probably wouldn’t meet much opposition, either.

Beside him, Kitty popped a small white pill, washing it down with another bottle of Coke. It definitely wasn’t aspirin.

“I’m not sure I want to ask what you just took,” he said. Having a drugged Trask would be bad enough -- if Kitty wasn’t fully in the moment, it could cause problems.

“Relax. It’s just half a Vicoden. If my ribs keep acting like a bitch, I’ll be useless. And then probably dead.”

She had a point, but still. He’d seen what those did to her. They didn’t need anyone getting an organ yanked out by mistake. Unless, of course, that person was Alfred -- perhaps keeping him closer to her would be a good idea. His stupid zombie brain was already afraid of her.

This being Paris at rush hour, it took far too long to get to the hospital. Since the elder Charles’s hover-chair would stand out like a strawberry in a bowl of cauliflower, it fell to his younger self to deal with the paperwork alone. That, unfortunately, took even longer, and the sun was well on its way to setting by the time they got Trask into the bus.

The man, Erik noted with grim satisfaction, looked like hell. He’d lost a great deal of weight he couldn’t afford to lose in the first place, leaving his face almost skeletal. Hair and mustache had both been shaved, and his eyes were so glazed with drugs that Erik wondered if he was even aware of his surroundings.

“Thank you,” Charles was saying to the orderly. “We’ll have him returned tomorrow.”

Erik wondered just what story the ‘contacts’ had fed the hospital. It had to have been a good one, for the orderly to simply release Trask into the care of a huge group of people on a private bus.

Both his elder self and the elder Charles watched Trask closely as he was loaded on board -- the former with unveiled hostility, and the latter with open curiosity. Some things, it would seem, did not change with age.

“ _I used to want you dead_ ,” Kitty sang, as Trask was led by, “ _but now I only want you gone._ ”

Clarice snorted into her hand. “ _You’ve got your short, sad life left_ ,” she contributed.

“ _That’s what I’m counting on_ ,” Kitty replied, trying not to giggle.

“ _I’ll let you get right to it._ ” Clarice barely got the last word out before she snickered.

“ _Now I only want you gone._ ”

Erik wasn’t going to ask. He wasn’t going to do it. Trask’s dazed, confused expression made it worthwhile, at least. The man stared at them both like he’d never seen human beings before.

The bus trundled onward, at some points barely creeping across the pavement. Paris, like so many European cities, had not been designed to accommodate modern traffic, and as a result, the streets were choked each morning and evening -- and often half the day in between. He shut his eyes, letting his head rest against the back of the seat, and went to sleep.

\--

By the time they reached the mansion, full night had fallen. This far into the past, the highways had nothing like streetlamps, so they zoomed through the dark with nothing but the headlights to keep the shadow from swallowing them whole.

Marie didn’t find it unduly creepy, but she _was_ quite wary -- which was probably only smart. She took her cue from the Sharley in her head, who was still calm, and from Logan-the-Stranger, who never seemed to be bothered by much of anything. If they weren’t scared yet, there was no point in her jumping the gun. 

She couldn’t help but tense, though, when they entered the long, circular driveway. The hair stood up on the back of her neck, and she could feel her whole skin prickle. She had to remind herself that things were different this time around: they knew what they were facing, and they had resources they hadn’t possessed the first time around. Sure, the Stranger freaked her right the hell out, but at least it was on their side, had the same goals that they did. Add in what Sharley had given her, and she figured they at least had a fighting chance.

That did not, however, mitigate the dread that seized her as soon as she’d left the bus. This wasn’t ordinary, simple fear of darkness, or paranoia about what they were shortly going to face. This gripped her chest and squeezed, practically forcing her breath from her lungs. Even worse, she felt Sharley freeze within her mind, and terror not her own joined the fear churning in her gut. Something was not right.

Logan-the-Stranger seemed to know it as well, for it kept her near when they left the bus. “When we go into that basement, I must lead, and you must come last. The Memories might recognize me, but I _know_ they will recognize you. The power you have been given is unique, and what I showed you of Old Echo is hardly the only time we have dealt with the Memories. They will know me for what I am, and you for what you have taken. Touch his hand,” it ordered.

Marie hesitated, but she knew why it made the request. She didn’t need to hang on long enough to actually hurt Logan -- fifteen seconds or so was all it would take, for her to be able to borrow his healing factor. She stripped off a glove and carefully took his hand, holding only until she felt the pull of her mutation draw his into her. He staggered a little, shaking his head, but the Stranger didn’t release its grip on him.

_Whatever you do_ , Sharley said, _don’t touch the Memories. With your gift, I have no fucking idea what would happen, and I don’t want to find out._

That was a warning Marie really didn’t need. She had no intention of getting close enough to one to _let_ it touch her.

The entire crew turned on flashlights, turning the yard into a confusing dance of pale beams that cut through the night like knives. Though the power was on in the mansion, there was none in the basement itself, and most of them had seen enough horror movies to know better than to trust the electricity to stay functional.

Thanks to the senses she’d borrowed from Logan, Marie could smell the spike in tension that came when the Professor unlocked the front door. Logan-the-Stranger went first, and the rest followed almost single-file, marching like prisoners off to face their doom. 

\--

Clarice was tense as hell, terror tightening every sinew in her body. After so long in the bad future, she’d learned how to rein in her fight-or-flight response, but that didn’t make this any easier. Every instinct she had was screaming at her to get as far away as she could.

Kitty nudged her with an elbow. “Stick close to me,” she said. “If you’re in reach, I can at least keep anything from stabbing you.”

“I can throw you out through a portal, if I have to,” she returned. “I could drag us all out, if it really comes down to it.” Except she wasn’t sure she’d dare -- what if they somehow brought the Memories with them? The one thing they had going for them was the fact that the damn creatures were trapped underground. Clarice sure as hell wasn’t going to be the one who fucked that up.

“I really wish we could all borrow Logan’s healing,” Kitty grumbled. “That wouldn’t make this easy, but at least it would feel like less of a one-sided fight.”

Both of them fell silent as they traversed the hallways. The sound of their footsteps was magnified by the high, empty walls, shoes squeaking on the tile floor. Somehow, the fact that the lights still worked was worse than darkness would have been, because it was such a false reassurance. 

No sooner had she thought it than the power cut out, leaving them with only their flashlights. Clarice almost swallowed her tongue, a shudder wracking her from head to toe. She hadn’t though it possible for skin to actually crawl, but it was doing that and then some.

Logan-the-Stranger froze so abruptly that half of them crashed to a dead stop. This resulted in quite a bit of swearing, which she contributed to with enthusiasm, until she peered around Logan’s arm.

“Oh, mother _fuck_ ,” Kitty whispered.

There was a person in the hallway -- a young woman in an old-fashioned white nurse’s uniform. She was so still Clarice might have thought her a statue, but her eyes...even in the glare of the flashlights, her pupils remained dilated, so large that only a thin ring of startlingly blue iris remained. They flickered over the entire group, swift yet thorough, taking them all in with a heart-stopping hunger.

Her head tilted to one side, and she gave them something that might have been a smile, if it hadn’t been ripped out of the depths of Clarice’s nightmares.

The Memories were no longer in the basement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, there must be the obligatory dun, dun, duuuun! Well, they’re good and fucked now.
> 
> The song Kitty and Clarice sing, “Want You Gone”, is sung by GLaDOS at the end of Portal 2. I thought it was appropriate.


	32. One Day More

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which things go to hell in earnest, there is a spectacular failure to kick ass (not for want of trying), and we have our first casualties. (Though not fatalities. Yet.)

The Memory stared at them, and they at it. No one moved.

Kitty had a horrible thought -- what if they were like velociraptors, and this one was just distracting them all, while two more moved in from the sides? What if there was one sneaking up behind Rogue?

_She’s not stupid. She’ll have thought of that herself._

_I hope._

She grabbed Clarice’s braid, pulling her backward a little, automatically phasing just a hair outside of full solidity. Her heart was thundering so hard she was was afraid it would fail on her at any moment -- not helped when Erik tried to touch her shoulder, and his hand went right through.

“Sorry,” she muttered, phasing back just long enough to let him join in on the intangibility bandwagon. Maybe if they all held hands with her, the Memories wouldn’t actually be able to hurt anyone.

The Memory’s lips parted, her eyes fixed on Logan-the-Stranger. “We. Know you,” she said, the words oddly stilted. “You should. Not be. Here.”

“Neither should you,” the Stranger said flatly. “Need to take you home now.”

Again, that spine-chilling smile. “No,” she said softly. “We. _Are_ home. _All_ of. Us.”

 _That_ struck Kitty as even more ominous than...well, everything else. According to the Professor, there ought to be eighteen of them, total, but the way this thing talked, it sounded like it meant more than that. Possibly a lot more. Shit.

Rogue made her way forward, easing her way through the crowd behind Logan. Watching her wasn’t quite as unsettling as watching Logan-the-Stranger, who was so obviously not himself. This was still Rogue, but Rogue with a few...additions. The way she moved was a little wrong -- a touch too smoothly -- and her expression, in the glow of the flashlights, wasn’t entirely human.

“No,” she said, “you’re not. Sharley can’t come get you herself, but she’s got us.”

The Memory froze, all the vicious glee draining from her face. Fury twisted it, but Kitty would swear that there was, for the barest fraction of a second, a trace of fear in those flat, hungry eyes.

“Clarice,” Marie said, not taking her eyes off the thing, “drop it in the basement.”

“ _Gladly_ ,” Clarice muttered, flicking her wrist. A purplish-black portal opened up beneath the Memory’s feet, and it did indeed drop -- at first. One pale hand shot out and caught the portal’s edge, clinging like a spider, and what in fucking hell did it think it was doing? You couldn’t just grab the edges of her portals like that! There was nothing real to grip.

She snapped the thing shut on instinct, leaving the disembodied hand sticking up from the floor. The sight might have been funny, had the situation been less terrifying.

“Go now,” whispered urgently. “Out. If I have to face these fuckers, I’d rather do it outside.”

Clarice couldn’t blame her. Nuking it from orbit was looking like a better and better idea.

“I thought we had to go down into the basement,” Hank said, his voice cracking.

“Things have changed,” Rogue said softly. “ _We_ need to go --” she gestured between Logan and herself. “The rest of you need to take care of this house.”

“What do you mean, ‘take care of it’?” Raven asked. She at least didn’t sound completely scared out of her mind, but maybe she was just better at hiding it.

Rogue turned to face them, her expression even stranger. That odd stillness was even more pronounced, and Clarice would swear that her left eye had a faint sheen of green and blue laid over the brown. Oh, wonderful. Because they needed more creepiness. “Make sure they haven’t made it out of the house,” she said. “And if they have...use your gifts. Just know that you can’t kill them, because they aren’t alive. 

“Professors, whatever you do, don’t try to read their minds. Memories are a hive-mind. The only time Sharley saw a telepath try to read one, it almost killed the woman. Link everybody up, if you can. And be careful,” she sighed. “Even of each other. If the Memories kill any of you, it will just create a new one -- one that looks like you. Go in groups, not pairs, and split all the humans up between you. I’d say good luck, but I don’t think we have any of that left.”

 _Not sure we had any to begin with_ , Clarice thought, looking at the hand. Somehow, she didn’t trust that thing to stay trapped.

“Any other words of advice?” Erik asked. His customary sarcasm was notably absent.

Rogue smiled. While it wasn’t as horrifying as the Memory’s expression, it was a little too vicious to be her own. “You might...find things, from time to time. Whatever I can yank out of the past that could be useful.”

Clarice couldn’t decide if that sounded encouraging, or scary as hell. It was probably best to assume the second.

Rogue and Logan-the Stranger moved on, past the hand, and the rest followed in a slow, spread-out line. Kitty kept a firm grip on Clarice’s braid, evidently determined to keep her in their own group. She wondered, fleetingly, who was going to get stuck with Trask and Zombie Alfred, and hoped like hell it wasn’t her. She didn’t think she was capable of keeping either alive, and wondered if anyone else was, either. 

When they reached the first hallway, Kitty paused, and her hold on Clarice’s braid meant Clarice did, too. She turned, and found Kitty looking at Erik. 

“Might as well, huh?” she said. “Time to play Red Rover with some Memories. Let’s just get this over with.”

\--

Ororo stayed near the young Professor. His elder self had a chair that could float, but the younger was at a severe disadvantage. While she believed Rogue’s assertion that the Memories couldn’t actually be harmed, they probably _could_ be slowed down with some wind and a few well-placed lightning bolts.

Anathea came with them as well. The poor girl was white with terror, her eyes and flashlight darting around, up to ceiling and into every corner. Lia seemed somewhat more self-possessed, but barely.

Unfortunately, they also had Trask. The Professor didn’t want to let him out of sight, which meant they were saddled with a drugged-up burden that they had to make certain survived. Unless, of course, they _all_ died, which would make the point rather moot.

They moved through the hallways as quietly as they could. Anathea and Lia both had baseball bats, but they were much like a security blanket: they’d be of very little use against a Memory, yet they were better than nothing.

The house seemed eerily empty, as though that lone Memory had been its only occupant, but didn’t trust that for an instant. No matter how far from it they went, the sense of soul-crushing dread didn’t ease in the slightest; it fluttered in her abdomen like a trapped rat, her pulse thundering in her ears. One of them was near -- she knew it, she could _feel_ it, but it was nowhere to be found --

Anathea screamed. 

Ororo whirled around, and found one of the things so close behind them it could have reached out and touched Lia. The woman staggered backward, but she wasn’t quick enough -- the Memory’s left hand shot out and raked her down the entire length of her face.

Anathea grabbed her, dragging her out of reach, trying to staunch the sudden, horribly rapid flow of blood. The thing tried to snatch at them both, but Ororo’s instincts kicked in before her brain even had time to fully process the situation.

Lightning jagged through the air, arcing over the girls’ heads, slamming into the Memory like an electrified sledgehammer. As she expected, it seemed to do the thing no harm at all, but it _did_ drive it backward.

“ _Go!_ ” she snarled. “Both of you, get back. _Now._ ”

Back they staggered, while she drove the Memory onward. She had no idea what in hell she was supposed to _do_ with it -- she couldn’t drop it through a portal like Clarice, but she obviously couldn’t electrocute it, either.

Fate -- or something -- came to her rescue. The air around the Memory rippled, flickering into a strange transparency of wooden rigging and tall pillars of marble, rather like the ones that adorned the hallway. Before she had time to wonder just what the hell was going on, the ghost-image solidified, and the entire mess came crashing down upon the Memory like the fall of a small mountain.

Ororo blinked, momentarily totally nonplussed, until she remembered Rogue’s words: things could get pulled out of the past. It looked like she’d just dropped a load of historical construction right down onto the damn thing.

Okay then. It probably wouldn’t hold the Memory for long, but any reprieve was better than nothing.

Trask, drugged though he was, still had enough coherence left to try to run like hell -- as any sensible person would do. Ororo tackled him before he made it more than three steps, and shoved him at the Professor. They might not be able to trank him again so soon, but the Professor could at least give him some kind of telepathic sedative.

Lia’s face was bleeding freely, and Anathea had stripped off her outer shirt to put pressure on the cuts. It was difficult to tell just how bad they were, considering all head wounds bled like there was no tomorrow. They had to get her out of here, but they couldn’t let the two women wander off on their own, completely defenseless -- nor could they abandon their search. 

“Hold that on her face,” the Professor said. “We’ll try to move slowly. Lia, we’ll look out for you.” In the uneven illumination of their flashlights, he’d gone very pale, but his composure didn’t break. “Stay close to me.”

They didn’t really have a choice. The group crept onward, hyper-vigilant, Ororo constantly checking behind them as well as in front. She’d forgotten about the Memory’s nails, how easily they could slash a person apart, and she’d be damned if she’d let one get close enough to any of them to do that again.

She was so intent, and so wound-up, that she almost fried Hank and Raven. The pair of them, along with Irena and Janek, came sneaking out around a corner, all of them bearing cricket bats. For a second, Ororo thought of that old movie, _Shaun of the Dead_ , and had to fight a wild, terror-driven impulse to laugh. 

“Jesus _Christ!_ ” Raven hissed, barely managing to stop her swing before she actually clocked Ororo in the head. “Did you find anything?”

“Something found us,” Ororo said, pointing at poor Lia. Hank, in all his blue-furred glory, hurried forward to help, only for Anathea to choke back a shriek.

“...He does that,” Ororo said, far too late. “Probably should have warned you.”

Raven winced. “Oops.”

Trask, though more dazed than ever, looked at Hank and Raven, blinked -- and screamed bloody murder.

“Oh, fuck everything,” Raven snapped, and brained him with her bat before anyone could stop her.

“Raven,” the Professor groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Was that really necessary? We can’t afford to carry him.”

“I’ll do it,” Hank called, inspecting Lia’s face. The wounds were still bleeding, but that came as no surprise. “Better than letting him run around on his own.”

He had a good point, but what about Lia? If she kept on bleeding as she was, she might not be able to stay conscious, and neither Janek nor Irena looked capable of carrying her very far. Ororo doubted even Hank could handle two people at once, no matter how small one of them might be.

In the distance -- possibly at the other end of the entire house -- something crashed. No, calling it a ‘crash’ was a vast understatement: it sounded like some portion of the roof had given way. Another gift of Rogue’s? 

They had no time to wonder. Another Memory had drifted up behind Janek and Irena like a goddamn ghost -- one second it wasn’t there, and the next it was, reaching. At least this time Ororo had the presence of mind to hurl lighting at it before it could actually claw anyone.

Janek and Irena, not being half as stupid as Magneto might have expected, threw themselves to the floor, crawling away from the thing’s reach. The Memory staggered backward, its movements almost drunken, but the high, unearthly screech it let out made Ororo’s heart falter. There had been hunger in its eyes before: now there was pure murder.

No falling construction materials came to their aid this time. Nothing was going to take care of this one for them; all she could do was keep hitting it, and hope she could drive it back toward the kitchen, to the basement door. The coppery scent of lightning filled the air, thickening it into something that almost seared her lungs, but she drove the thing onward, because really, what choice did she have? 

It wasn’t enough. Somehow, the Memory managed to charge her, pushing back against her lightning. Its fingers almost touched her face, but Hank, still in full Beast mode, plowed into it like a wrecking ball. Man and Memory crashed into the wall so hard it actually dented, but Hank dodged and rolled before it could claw him.

Something else crashed, much closer. Ororo barely had time to shove the Professor’s wheelchair our of the way before another Memory came flying right through the wall, a four-foot length of steel rebar skewering its abdomen. The thing obviously didn’t feel any pain, but it was mad as hell, clawing at the rebar and hissing. The truly terrifying part came when its nails actually sheared right through the metal. There was no screech -- no sound at all. It came apart like butter beneath a knife.

Kitty, Clarice, and the young Erik phased through what remained of the wall, hand-in-hand like schoolchildren. The image was not nearly as amusing as it ought to be.

“So much for splitting up,” Kitty said. “Clarice dropped a couple of those things back into the basement, and I’m pretty sure Rogue was behind the Model-T that ran over a couple more. We think we got them into the basement, too, since they were under the car when Clarice portaled it.”

Somewhere behind her, Raven laughed. It was brief, though, and followed by a grunt as she hit their remaining Memory with her bat.

“Oh, for God’s sake.” Erik released Clarice’s hand, and waved his over the floor. The pipes, all old copper, ripped up through the floor with a tearing squeal and a groan of buckled hardwood flooring. They caught the Memory, wrapping around its arms and its throat with a speed it didn’t quite manage to dodge. “Clarice, if you please.”

A purplish-black portal opened beneath thing, dropping it and its copper bonds down into the basement. The one impaled by the rebar went next, leaving the group alone among the wreckage.

“I don’t like this,” Kitty said, glancing up and down the hallway. “It’s too easy. I think they’re fucking with us.”

“Most likely,” the Professor said, strained. “I can’t read their minds, but I can _feel_ them. Some of them are closing in on us, but the others...the others are headed outside. My elder self, and Erik’s, are guarding, but they won’t be enough.”

“Well, shit,” Clarice said faintly. “Now what? Back outside?”

Before anyone could respond, a Memory appeared out of the hole in the wall with the suddenness and silence of a ghost. Its hand tried to tear through Erik’s back -- but he still had hold of Kitty’s hand, and it passed right through.

“Oh, no you goddamn _don’t_ ,” she snarled, grabbing its wrist. She shoved it aside with surprising strength, phasing it into the wrecked wall -- and leaving in there. “You good?” she asked, looking up at Erik.

He did not, in fact, look good at all, but at least he wasn’t torn apart. His face had gone the hue of old library paste, and he looked ready to pass out at any moment, swaying on his feet.

“I’m gonna take that as a ‘no’,” she said. “Clarice, get us outside, before that thing gets free.”

“Right.” One of her portals opened up a good distance away from the trapped Memory, and they fled to it in thundering herd. Even Trask, who looked well away with the fairies, knew he ought to be moving in a certain direction.”

The night air, still warm, was a welcome blessing, and for a second all Ororo could do was stand still, breathing it in. She didn’t seem to be the only one, either.

She turned, eyeing the house. Her idea might not work, but at least it would slow the bastards down. There was enough electricity in the air already that it really wasn’t difficult to call on the lightning, and bend it to her will with a precision she’d never yet attempted. 

It surrounded the house, walls and roof alike, caging it in a flickering, almost blinding filigree. The bolts arced into one another, their cage ever-shifting, and she hoped like hell it would at least be a _little_ effective.

The sheer effort it took left her gasping, but her cage held.

The elder Professor’s voice echoed in her head. _Are you all out here?_

 _Everyone but Rogue and Logan_ , she said, trying to regulate her breathing. _Why?_

_Don’t move._

“Stay still, everybody,” she called. Not that she particularly needed to, since it didn’t seem like anyone was in a hurry to move anyway.

The wrought-iron fence that surrounded the yard began to shudder, bars tearing free of the dry earth like a string of firecrackers. The entire thing ripped from the ground in one smooth motion, rising up, and shot toward the house. It crashed through the lightning-barrier, electricity pinging and sizzling wherever it hit the electrical current as it wrapped around the first story of the house. It would seem that the elder Magneto was still alive and kicking, too.

“Good to know I haven’t lost my touch, in my old age,” his younger self said, wiping his forehead on his sleeve. “Where am I, out there?”

“Not sure. I think we should spread out,” Ororo said. “Just in case.” She paused. “Where’s Alfred?”

“With the older Professor and Magneto, I hope,” Clarice said. “If not, he’s still somewhere wandering around the house.”

“Such a loss,” Erik said, with such deadpan blandness that Ororo almost laughed. 

The impulse died when she saw what had crept up behind him -- _how_ it had snuck up, she didn’t know, and it didn’t really matter. He was a tall man, so she could be forgiven for not noticing the young boy who was quite suddenly within grabbing distance.

“ _Look out!_ ” she cried. She didn’t dare light the little bastard up with Erik so close to it.

Unfortunately, instinct made him first turn to see just what he was meant to be looking out for -- and the thing reached out and raked its claw-nails down his chest.

“Oh, fucking hell.” Kitty dove at him, grabbing his wrist before the thing could strike again. This time its hand passed right through him, and she yanked him aside so hard he landed on his knees. Somehow, she actually managed to drag him out of the way, leaving Ororo a clear path to hit the thing without hitting _them._ “Clarice, portal! _Now!_ ”

Clarice didn’t need to be told twice. As soon as she’d thrown the portal, Ororo hit the Memory with everything had, the sheer force of the blast sending the thing flying. The portal snapped closed almost before the thing was all the way through it.

“You’d better not die,” Kitty ordered, trying to hold the flashlight steady as she took in Erik’s bloody shirt. “If you die, I swear to Christ I’ll pee on your grave.” There was a type of hysteria in her voice that Ororo had never heard from her. She was, for once, flat-out terrified -- and extremely pissed off because of it. Should they find that Memory again, Ororo would not want to be in its shoes, no matter that it was some kind of undead force of evil.

“Well, we can’t have that,” he said, but his voice was weak. The front of his shirt was absolutely drenched with blood that looked, in the uneven light, almost black.

“Let me see,” Hank said, kneeling beside him. “Kitty, hold that light steady. The rest of you, make sure there aren’t any more surprises like that.”

Not an order the rest of them needed. They didn’t dare go far, but they formed a protective ring -- all but Lia, who, having an impromptu bandage around her face, was all but blind. She stayed near Hank, poised to flee as soon as anyone told her to.

Hank ripped the rest of Erik’s shirt apart, inspecting. Four deep claw-marks ran the entire length of his chest, gushing red, and even Ororo came close to panicking. Those were not superficial wounds.

Hank investigated with swift, professional thoroughness. “It’s not as bad as it looks,” he said, his relief almost palpable. “You’re going to need a hell of a lot of stitches, but that thing didn’t hit anything vital. We just need to get these bandaged up.”

He grabbed the rest of Erik’s ruined shirt, ripping it into strips and knotting them together with the same speed and skill. It very obviously wasn’t going to be enough.

“Oh, goddammit,” Kitty grumbled, shrugging out of her outer shirt -- an ancient flannel that was far too big for her, and had probably been left behind by some student. “Use that. In case you hadn’t realized, this is probably going to hurt,” she added, looking down at Erik.

He actually arched an eyebrow. “No, I thought it was going to feel like kittens walking all over me,” he said, and though his voice was still weak, his tone was dry.

Well, that was a good thing. If he could still snark, he probably wasn’t going to die.

Kitty and Hank between them managed to sit up up enough to wrap their makeshift bandage. His face was far too pale, but that was only to be expected, and he hissed when the bandage was tightened, his expression, even through the pain, damn near murderous.

“Oh, calm your tits,” Kitty said. “There’s nothing out here to kill right now.”

He gave her a look that was one part incredulity, one part indignation, and two parts resignation, before he actually started laughing. “Your bedside manner could use some work.”

“So sue me. You’re not going anywhere, so get comfy.”

The fact that he didn’t argue was a somewhat worrying sign, but Ororo had no time to worry. Though there was no sign of any more of the things, they could creep more silently than a breeze.

“That’s as good as I can make it,” Hank said, tying off the last end. “Kitty, you have to stay and keep him intangible. If the Memories come back, he and Lia can’t run, but if you’re...you...they can’t hurt you.”

Given that they probably couldn’t have pried her away with a crowbar, it was the only viable option. “Don’t get yourselves killed, okay? I’ll try to come get you if I absolutely have to, but that would involve trying to carry this asshole, so I’m not making any promises.”

“I heard that,” Erik muttered. He sounded about as lightheaded as he looked.

“Duh, you’re right next to me. My point stands. If you really need help, scream.”

“If we hit the point where we start screaming, we’re probably _beyond_ help,” the Professor pointed out. His expression was pure conflict as he looked at Erik, and Ororo hoped he wasn’t about to try for any actual reconciliation right now. They did not remotely have enough time for it.

“Good point. Come on, Professor. We really need to go hunting.” 

He looked at her, something akin to anguish in his eyes -- but he didn’t protest. She was right, and he knew it.

“Be careful, you three,” Ororo warned. Not that she probably needed to -- thanks to Kitty’s mutation, they were safer than absolutely everyone else. Hard to kill something when you couldn’t actually touch it.

Kitty tipped her a salute with her free hand. “You, too. If anybody else gets hurt, just drag them out here. I can keep us all from getting eaten.”

Ororo really, really hoped it wouldn’t come down to that. Whatever Rogue and Logan were doing in the basement, she prayed they’d do it fast.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, Erik and Lia are the first casualties. We can only hope there won’t be any actual fatalities. Next up are Rogue and Logan, and just what they’re up to in the basement.


	33. The Darkest Hour

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Marie learns (and does) some terrifying things, the others continue to have a completely shitty time of it, and Sharley makes some Plans for our favorite couple (assuming they all survive). We also get our first look into the hive-mind of the Memories themselves.
> 
> A warning: this chapter is _extremely_ violent. I mean it.

The basement would have seemed a lot darker if Marie hadn’t borrowed Logan’s senses.

Oh, it _was_ dark, but to her eyes, the blackness was not absolute. There were...things...shifting within it: amorphous grey shades, twisting together and breaking apart again. The further she and Logan went, the more of them they saw, thickening around them in some sort of choking mist. Without Logan’s healing ability, she might well have choked.

Logan-the-Stranger said nothing, and Sharley was quiet within Marie’s mind. Hopefully thing was a good thing; surely, if she’d sensed anything about to murder them all, she would have said something.

The darkness shifted a little as they went on, grey giving way to a dead, dull red, very like the sky in the Other. The light came from nowhere, no single, discernible source -- it was a luminescent smudge, sickly and weak and uncomfortably warm. Near the door, the basement had been cold, but the heat rose the further they went.

 _All right, Sharley_ , she thought, _what the hell am I lookin’ at?_

 _They’re idiots_ , Sharley said, disbelief thick even in her mental voice. _They’re absolute fucking_ morons. _They’re -- well, shit. I think I know what they’re doing, but I’m not sure how to fix it._

Oh, that wasn’t encouraging. _Wha_ t are _they doin’?_

_They’re trying to make a door into the Other. They must be hive-minded with the Memories on the other side._

_I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess that that’s a_ bad _thing_ , Rogue said. _So what do we do about it?_

Sharley’s answer was even less encouraging. _You have some fun._

 _Don’t you mean_ we’ll _have some fun?_

_Nope. I’m just a passenger here, Marie. This is your rodeo. I can tell you what you have to do, but I can’t help you do it. It’s all down to you._

Marie didn’t particularly want to hear that, but she doubted Sharley would feed her a line of shit. _Okay. So what_ do _we do?_

_Keep goin’ forward. Your buddy with the portals has dropped a few more Memories down here, but if the Stranger doesn’t let you know where they are first, I will. I doubt they’ll dare come too close, though, since they know it and I are here. In a manner of speakin’._

Okay, at least that was a little comforting. Marie kept on, Logan-the-Stranger beside her. It was so damn unnerving, seeing him like this -- it was Logan, yet it really, really wasn’t. Sharley might be riding shotgun in her brain, but the Stranger was definitely driving the bus in his. Would he remember any of this? Kitty didn’t seem to have any memory at all of what she’d done under the Stranger’s influence, and neither did Marie herself. He’d probably be pissed, if he woke up and found he’d lost the last fourteen hours.

 _Assuming we survive_ , she thought, a little sourly. The further they went, the heavier the air seemed to become, until it was almost like trying to walk through something halfway solid.

 _You’re not gonna die_ , Sharley said. _You see the ghost-images, right? Well, focus. They’re connected by threads. What you need to do is grab the right one -- and do it now, because there’s a Memory about to eat some of your friends._

“Oh, shit. Where?” she asked aloud.

 _Up and to the left. Look at the house -- all of it -- and see what you can grab_.

The flicker of endless, transparent potentiality was almost overwhelming, but she found something. The mansion had been built well over a century ago, when construction safety hadn’t been much more than a joke. Scaffold, scaffold, masonry tools -- ah. Big chunk of marble. She reached out, hands physically tangling in the cat’s-cradle of threads, and _pulled_.

It was the weirdest fucking thing she’d ever felt in her life, and that was really saying something. The jolt of it spread through her like lightning, but it wasn’t quite electricity -- it burned, but it didn’t hurt, shooting through her every nerve and lighting her senses up like a firework.

“Holy shit,” she muttered, prompting Logan-the-Stranger to look at her. It didn’t appear surprised.

 _Good job_ , Sharley said, genuine approval in her voice. _Did better at that than I did, my first time outta the gate._

_Should I do that down here? Should I really focus on all this shit in the basement?_

_Not yet. I’m gonna do a little pokin’. Want to make sure you aren’t gonna see somethin’ that’d drive you insane if you really saw it._ Sharley’s tone was quite serious, so much so that Marie wasn’t about to argue.

 _Let me know if there’s any more Memories up there I should know about. I think I can probably find any down here._ She hoped, anyway. In theory, they were pretty hard to miss, but from everything she’d seen in Sharley’s memory, they could sneak like anything if they put their minds to it.

 _Stranger’ll find them, if you can’t,_ Sharley said. _And I’m still here, so if you need me, I’ll turn up again._

 _Please do_ , Marie said fervently.  
\--

Sharley was worried, but mostly she was just pissed -- pissed that the Memories dared show up here, pissed that these poor bastards had to deal with them, and _definitely_ pissed that she couldn’t come herself.

Still, she trusted these two. Without them, nothing she and the Stranger could do would be enough, but this pair? In all her (very long) life, she’d only see one other couple with a bond like they had. It wasn’t just their almost inhuman determination: they were almost like two halves of a single entity. She could see their history, the nightmares they had already endured, separately and together. It had taken what had already existed between them, and tempered it into something the likes of which she’d very rarely seen.

The other pair she’d known were long dead, at least in their dimension. Logan might well live forever, but Marie was as fragile and mortal as any other human -- when she wasn’t borrowing his mutation. She’d grow old and die like humans did (so very fast, it seemed), and he’d be alone.

Once this was over, Sharley was going to have to see what she could do about that.

The Stranger knew what she’d do to it, if it let anything happen to Logan. There weren’t many people it obeyed, but it knew better than to cross her. The only way he wasn’t getting out alive would be if none of them did. But she didn’t think that would be a problem.

These Memories were...stupid. If they’d been anything like their cousins in the Other, they would have slaughtered this entire group within ten minutes. Memories weren’t meant to exist outside of the Other, let alone be created beyond its borders, and these had clearly suffered for it.

Good.

Still, she couldn’t let Marie have a real look around down here. Not yet. The poor woman had seen -- and endured -- far too many horrors in her short life, but not enough to be able to face _this_. Charles’s grandfather had been such a piece of work that Sharley wondered if he was some kind of trans-dimensional relative of another asshole she’d once known. Even that son of a bitch had never managed to make actual Memories, though.

Speaking of the fuckers, one of them came flying down through a portal, landing right beside Logan-the-Stranger. He clawed at the thing, flinging it away, in a motion very unlike the Stranger. Maybe he wasn’t as asleep as the others had been -- as Sharley herself had been, when it was a part of her. That bore thinking about, but not yet. Not until they actually had time.

\--

This was wrong. All of it.

The Memories knew how this was supposed to go, and it was not cooperating. The living were still alive and fighting back, and those two were involved. The mind in the Other was disappointed.

The woman who cast the portals was, for the moment, the biggest problem outside of the basement. Once she had been taken, those within the house could more easily kill the others. The one who could not be touched was another issue, and one they did not yet know how to deal with.

The pair in the basement were perhaps the worst. Mortal, yes, but short of tearing them apart, they would not die easily. While Memories felt no pain, and could not be physically destroyed even by the sword of Sharley’s father, the claws of the man the Stranger possessed were...unpleasant. And yet another annoyance.

They would scream, all of them, before this was over. The metal man’s pain was sweet, but his fear was nowhere near great enough. The truly human girl supplied a great deal of both, and the Memories sipped it like ambrosia as they hunted.

Portal Woman was in the southeast corner of the property, busily flinging them into the basement with the grace of a dancer. She was used, they thought, to fighting multiple enemies at once -- but her moves were technical, as though what she normally fought did not have the creativity of a truly sentient being. 

That, they decided, would be her undoing.

\--

After checking Erik’s and Lia’s bandages multiple times, Kitty actually found herself bored.

Oh, she was still terrified, and more than a little furious, yet somehow she also managed to be bored. How did that even work? 

Part of her knew. She’d come here intending to fight, and she’d done very little of that. All the adrenaline she’d built up had been thwarted, and didn’t quite know what to do with itself. Plus, she knew how ridiculous they had to look, three people holding hands on the grass while the house stayed caged by ever-shifting lightning, while the others fought for their lives.

“Hold still,” she ordered Erik, for the eighth time. “If you rip those bandages, it’s not like I can just go to the store and get more of them.”

“There’s a root under my back,” he complained. Even in the dim light, he was still far too pale, and she wondered just how much blood he’d lost. At least Lia’s face appeared to have stopped bleeding, though she was so quite and so still that it would have been easy to mistake her for dead. Kitty hoped she wasn’t going into shock, because if she did, they could hardly deal with it. 

Kitty rolled her eyes. “Seriously? All this shit, and _that’s_ what you complain about? I could try to shift you, but we’d have to do it really, _really_ carefu --”

She froze. Her simmering fear quite suddenly boiled over into stomach-clenching dread. Erik’s eyes widened, and Lia let out an aborted shriek.

“...There’s a Memory behind me, isn’t there?” Kitty asked, barely able to force the words out. Her throat was suddenly so dry she almost couldn’t speak.

“There is,” he said, his hand gripping hers so tightly she was half afraid he’d break it.

“They can’t hurt us,” she said, her voice wavering. “They can’t touch us. Whatever you do, don’t let go of Lia’s hand.”

He nodded, his eyes flickering to the space above Kitty’s head. She knew she shouldn’t turn around, she _knew_ it, but she had to. She couldn’t stand not knowing what was behind her. So she half-turned, still gripping Erik’s hand, dread eating at her from the inside out.

The Memory was right behind her. _Right_ behind her, so close that she could easily have touched its face with her free hand. It was the woman in the nurse’s uniform, kneeling on the grass, watching with those horrible, blank, hungry eyes. How had it made it out of the basement?

“Hi,” Kitty said weakly, barely aware that she was speaking at all. “Please don’t eat us.”

The Memory smiled, this one even worse than the last. “How do. You. Do. It?” it asked, a kind of hungry curiosity in its tone. Its right hand tried to caress Kitty’s face, but passed right through. “Yours is not. Like theirs. Or ours.”

Ours? _Ours_? Kitty’s heart just about failed her at the implication. Did these goddamn things still have the mutations they’d possessed when they were alive?

“Oh, mother _fuck_ ,” she breathed. “No, no no _fuck no_.”

The thing’s smile widened. “You. Understand. And. You fear,” it said, its fingers again passing through Kitty’s cheek.

She shuddered, but didn’t dare close her eyes. The thing had her halfway hypnotized, that terrible blank stare pinning her in place, and she wondered if this was what a rodent felt like, when it found itself confronted by a snake.

“Kitty,” Erik said softly, “ _duck_.”

She did, automatically: she’d spent so many years in a future full of deadly fights that some things were instinctive. Her forehead was pressed against her knees, but she heard the fence-prison around the house shriek as some piece of it broke free, the speed of it whistling through the air as it drove itself right through the Memory -- knocking it away through the sheer force of impact.

“Thanks,” she said, her voice wavering as she raised her head and looked a the thing. She didn’t expect it to look like it was in pain, but she _had_ expected anger -- it should have raged like the one he’d impaled in the house, but instead it looked at the fence-rail sticking out of its ribcage...and it _laughed_.

It was, hands-down, the most horrible thing she had ever heard in her life. Behind her, Lia whimpered, and Erik drew a hissing gasp of pure terror. His grip on Kitty’s hand tightened until she could swear she felt her bones creak.

“You are all. So stubborn,” the Memory said, yanking the rail out. “You cannot. Win. Why. Do you try?”

Kitty was so not down with trying to get in a philosophical discussion with this thing, but if it was with them, it was one less Memory the others had to fight. “It’s what we do. Living things...uh, we kind of like to stay alive.”

Another Memory was approaching, an odd, awful smile on its face. There was yet another behind that one -- what the hell were they doing? Why were so many of them converging on the three people who _weren’t_ causing them problems?

She drew a deep, shuddering breath, struggling to maintain any kind of equanimity. Maybe they were trying to fuck with her, trying to break her concentration enough to drive her back to solidity. Attempting that would _definitely_ keep them occupied for a while, because they apparently didn’t realize that full solidity was not her natural state of being. They could claw all they liked – it would suck, and it would be terrifying as hell, but it wouldn’t do them any good. And they’d be away from the others.

“What--?” Lia asked, the word barely qualifying as a whisper.

“It’s okay,” Kitty said, hoping the girl would understand. “They can’t hurt us.” _They can’t hurt us. Not if we stay still. If I stay like me._

\--

This was getting ridiculous. 

There were only eighteen Memories, right? It seemed like as fast as Clarice threw them into the basement, the faster they got out, and _how_? Were the barriers around the house really that ineffective, or could the Memories actually teleport?

At least she was in good shape. All those years fighting Sentinels had left her pretty damn fit, so she wasn’t yet out of breath – but if this kept up, she would be soon enough. It was like they were all congregating on her at once, determined to take her out before they went for the others; if that was really the case, she might just be completely fucked.

Though the air was chilling, she was dripping with sweat, pulse pounding as she danced her way through her attackers. They all seemed to radiate their own heat – a dry heat, very unlike the French humidity. It was desert-dry, and it smelled weirdly metallic, like they’d been rolled in hot pennies before being dropped in front of her.

 _Portal, jump, portal portal, duck, weave, portal, run, porta_ l PAIN

Clarice screamed, the sudden shock of total agony tearing through her in a scorching wave. A Memory had caught her shoulder, nails ripping through her skin like it was tissue-paper. She tried to dodge, but another grabbed her, this one tearing at her chest. She felt the heat of her own blood soaking through her shirt, the scent of it enough to make her gag, and then she couldn’t run, couldn’t do a damn thing, because one of the fuckers hamstrung her where she stood. 

She screamed again, but it was cut short when one of the razor-claws slashed her throat.

\--

The shriek that split the night was so loud, and so agonized, that Erik almost choked on his own tongue. That wasn’t a Memory-sound – that was both human and female. Too high to be Ororo or Anathea, it left only Clarice and Irena as potential sources.

Kitty’s head snapped up, her eyes widening. “ _Clarice_!” she screamed, twitching, and he thought he knew exactly what she was thinking: whatever was happening to her friend, she couldn’t help, because she could neither leave him and Lia nor carry them with her. “Shit, Clarice, portal! Get yourself the fuck out of there!”

All she received in response was another scream, this one abruptly aborted – and then nothing but silence.

The Memory behind her grinned its horrible death’s-head grin, left hand clawing at her back – and making contact. For the briefest instant, shock had made Kitty drop her intangibility, and the thing’s claws raked her from shoulder to hipbone.

Unlike Clarice, she didn’t make a sound. Perhaps the shock and pain ran too deep to be vocalized; for a second, it seemed she’d forgotten to breathe. She hadn’t forgotten to phase out again – when the Memory tried a second time, its hand passed through her, to the thing’s obvious disappointment.

Erik yanked Lia closer and slapped her hand on his shoulder, hoping she’d get the hint and keep it there, rather than try to run. He had nothing at all to staunch Kitty’s wounds with – nothing but his own hands, which weren’t going to be nearly enough. But he had to try.

She didn’t resist at all when he pulled her forward, though he almost screamed when her elbow hit the wounds on his chest. Whatever pain she was aware enough to feel had made her go rigid, and he had to tug on her arm, hard, to bring her back to reality.

She all but collapsed, which hurt even worse – black sparkles danced behind his eyes, and for a moment he was afraid he’d pass out entirely. Consciousness fought and won, however, and he tried to put enough pressure on the worst areas of her cuts. “Stay awake,” he ordered, when she hissed, and tensed again. “You have to stay awake, Kitty.” If she truly went into shock, if she fully lost consciousness, she might never come out of it. 

“They…she…Clarice…” Even forcing out those three words seemed to be almost more than she could handle, her tone completely and utterly lost.

“I know,” he said, his palm pressing harder on what he suspected was the deepest of the cuts. The heat of her blood on his hands was almost nauseating, and he had to fight the urge to gag. “I know, Kitty, and I’m sorry, but you need to stay awake. Talk to me.” If she kept talking, it might stave off the shock, or so he hoped. 

“About what?” she asked, so softly he almost didn’t hear her.

“Anything. Your parents, your first pet – what you want to do when we get out of here. Stay with us.” Lia still hadn’t let go of his shoulder, fortunately; she seemed to be too paralyzed to move at all, which right now was a good thing. If she didn’t run, the Memories couldn’t catch her.

“You really. Think. That will work?” the nearest Memory asked. It sounded genuinely puzzled. “Just. Die. It would be. Easier.”

“Shut _up_ ,” Erik snarled. “Come on, Kitty. Talk. What’s the stupidest thing you’ve ever done?”

She was quiet for so long that he was afraid she’d gone catatonic. “You mean, besides coming here?” she asked at last. Her voice was little more than an uneven rasp. “Jubilee once dared me to eat an entire tub of Cool Whip. I’ve never been so sick in my life, before or since.”

“You canno – ” the Memory started again, but he spoke over it.

“Who is Jubilee?” he prodded.

“My old roommate. My friend. She’s dead, too.”

Well, that was headed nowhere good. “What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done to another person?” He had to keep her talking. He had no idea how much longer it was going to take Logan and Marie, but he somehow needed to make Kitty stay awake until they were through. The Memories might well take out everyone else, but the damn things weren’t going to get _them_.

\--

By the time they reached the center of the basement, Marie herself had reached an odd sort of calm.

Sure, things were going to hell in a handbasket above her, there was God knew what all around her, and they might well all die before morning, no matter what Sharley said – she simply didn’t have the mental energy to be afraid of it.

The odd red light had grown stronger, though it still had no identifiable source. The heat had risen, too, so much so that she was sweating buckets. Of course it didn’t seem to bother Logan – or, well, Logan-the-Stranger.

 _All right, Marie,_ Sharley said, so gently that Marie was instantly wary. _I need you to look now._ Really _look. You aren’t gonna like what you’ll see, but you have to see it, if you’re gonna be able to manipulate it._

Yep, definitely wary now. Whatever she was about to see, she knew it was going to absolutely suck.

‘Really looking’ was more easily said than done. The ghost-images were such a confusing mash that they formed little more than a blob of transparency, indistinguishable from one another. The threads that connected them were a confused, tangle cat’s-cradle, so interwoven that she doubted she could ever find an end to pull on. Maybe it was like those pictures that were so popular when she was a kid, the weird patterns that you had to unfocus your eyes to see what the actual image was supposed to be.

It was worth a try. She halted, but didn’t try to restrain Logan-the-Stranger. Controlling that thing would probably be impossible. Forcing her vision to shift was harder than it probably ought to be: her eyes didn’t want to cooperate, as though they already knew what kind of horror they would see if they did.

_Eventually, though, persistence won out, and it was all Marie could do not to scream._

_They were around her, all of them, but in this vision they were not yet Memories. They were only people; figures of varying levels of transparency that she realized came from passing by her at different points in history._

_The basement itself was brightly lit, overhead lamps holding harsh, bare bulbs. A long row of tables spread out over the floor, each fitted with a set of steel restraints, the cracks in their pale Formica filled in with dark stains she didn’t need to wonder about. None of those who had suffered on them actually remained on them, but their shades, bloody and tortured, wandered around them in a daze. These were not Memories: there was no purpose to their movements, and they walked with pain rather than fury. She couldn’t imagine these people having the will or strength to murder anyone._

_There was one, though…this, she thought, had to be the Professor’s grandfather, though the man didn’t look much like the Professor at all. He was very tall, with a head of thick, greying hair, and eyes like sapphire drill-bits. He alone had any real solidity about him – and he was staring right at Marie._

That’s him, _Sharley said_. We deal with that shithead and everythin’ else’ll work just fine. 

How the hell do we _deal_ with him, exactly? _Marie asked_.

You see those threads around him? You grab, and you pull as hard as you can. We’re gonna wipe this asshole right outta history.

 _Marie was fairly sure that was a bad idea_. Won’t that cause a – I think the word is ‘paradox’? If he never existed, the Professor won’t either, right?

You leave that part to me. Now grab and yank, and let’s get this shit over with.

_Marie had no real choice but to trust her. Finding the right threads was not an easy task, and took much longer than she liked. The entire time, he stood and stared at her, a small smirk curving his lips. He seemed awfully damn sure of himself, and she only hoped Sharley knew better than either of them._

_Here they were. Four of them, all of different colors, almost luminescent, the light pulsing and ebbing as though each had their own heartbeat. She grabbed, she pulled – and she screamed._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoo boy. Why have I not added a ‘major character death’ tag? Have faith in me, readers, have faith. Next chapter we will see just what is up with our pair of Charles’s, and Magneto’s cranky older self. None of them are best pleased.


	34. Just Before Dawn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Marie gets a real taste of the kind of power she actually has, the Memories continue to be absolutely horrible to all involved, and even _they_ start having a shitty time of it.
> 
> As with last chapter, this one comes with a violence/gore warning.

_Pain. This was pain unlike anything Marie had ever known – worse than the most horrible of tortures she’d endured in the camps. It took full possession of her, from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes, a searing agony that threatened to burn her up from the inside out. What was this? Just what had he done – what had she done?_

I’ve got you, Marie, _Sharley said._ I’ve got you. Focus on the threads and let me deal with the rest.

_Marie couldn’t answer. She simply didn’t have the strength. The agony, however, abated slightly, which she put down to Sharley – undead Sharley, who could feel no pain. It hardened Marie’s resolve, and tightened her grip on the threads._

_To her vicious satisfaction, the smug man’s eyes widened, his expression losing some of its arrogance. He took a step backward, and she used his uncertainty to pull on the threads with every ounce of strength she had. While her physical body might still be very weak, her mind and will were tough as old leather, and she used both now. This asshole might think he was a connoisseur of torture, but she’d show him what_ real _torment was. She refused to think about just how wrong it was that she’d enjoy doing it._

Not wrong, _Sharley told her_. Human. You’re still human, in a way he never was. You keep on goin’. 

Gladly.

\--

Charles thought his head might split in two. 

Even his older self looked pained, but at least he was holding it together. Young Charles thought he would lose his mind if this went on much longer.

It wasn’t just the pain. Pain could be endured – God knew he’d done it often enough, in the last decade. Somehow, even distant proximity to the Memories felt like it was poisoning his soul; the foul toxin of their very existence had crept into his spirit and multiplied like the world’s most horrible virus. 

They had killed Clarice. He’d felt her die, and it had almost been enough to make him scream himself. Kitty, Erik, and Lia were all injured, and he’d tried to ease their pain as much as he could, until his own threatened to overwhelm him. 

The others lived, at least. Anathea, Janek, and Irena used themselves as human bait, drawing out the Memories so that Ororo could fry them, driving them back to the fence around the house. Erik’s elder self was doing his best to cage them there, wrapping the fence-posts around them as they squirmed, but it was a stopgap measure at best: somehow, they always broke free. He suspected that whatever passed for their bones was malleable to them, because they never failed to squeeze their way free.

Hank and Raven had made it back into the house, before Ororo set up her cage. They had barricaded themselves into the impromptu laboratory they had set up on their last visit; feverishly building something that he was very worried would be explosive. It was a foolish thing to do, bottling themselves up like that, but the Memories seemed otherwise occupied. If they were going to be burning his house down, he hoped they would at least wait until Logan and Rogue were out of the basement.

Rogue and Logan were all but impossible to track, and he thought there must be some sort of interference in the basement – psychic static that blocked all his attempts to penetrate it. He couldn’t feel overly terrible about his inability, however, since his elder self seemed to share it. His face was pale and beaded with sweat, but his expression was determined.

So far, none of the Memories had come after the two of them outside the house, a fact Charles found extremely odd. While his elder self’s chair floated, he himself was a sitting duck in his wheelchair, but they seemed to be ignoring him utterly, and why? It couldn’t be fear, or even wariness – his telepathy had no effect on them at all. Trask too was a sitting duck, close to unconscious as he was; he probably couldn’t have moved even if he was coherent enough to want to.

But maybe that was why. The pair of them posed little threat to the Memories; their mutations could do no harm. The others, by contrast…Clarice had been dropping them into the basement all evening, both Eriks attacked them with metal, Ororo controlled the very weather, and Kitty was more or less impossible to harm – unless she was sufficiently distracted. The Memories were taking out their greatest threats first.

“What do we do?” he asked his elder self, helpless. “We can try to take their pain, but what other use are we?”

“There is someone in Rogue’s head,” older Charles said. “I cannot find Rogue in the basement, but I can speak with the woman named Sharley, who currently sits within Rogue’s mind. She says the Memories fear us.”

“ _Why?_ ” he asked, genuinely startled. “What could we possibly do against them?”

“They learned to fear telepaths, long ago,” his elder self said. “They are a hive-mind, but they don’t think in the same way humans do. We cannot control them, but she thinks we can distract them. They were all mutants themselves – possibly, we can use that against them. Or rather, use them against each other.”

All right, he was intrigued. Anything was better than feeling so very useless. “So what do we do?”

His elder self sighed, and shook his head, a little ruefully. “We dive in,” he said, “and make as big a splash as we can.”

\--

Ororo’s energy was flagging fast. She was used to throwing around huge, sustained bursts of lightning, not dozens of smaller ones, and it was wearing on her in a way that surprised her. 

A Memory almost caught her when she heard the scream – Clarice’s scream, high and agonized. Panicked, she blasted the thing away, and the one behind it, and took off across the lawn. There was a second scream, cut off – and, arcing through the air like the universe’s most macabre fountain, a gout of blood lit up by the lightning-cage. Clarice collapsed like a puppet with cut strings, and the Memories turned to Ororo with disturbing synchrony. 

Her attack was instinct rather than calculation – rage, not rationality. She threw absolutely everything she had at them, the yard now nearly bright as day.

They laughed at her. The circling monsters _laughed_ at her, mocking her grief, their movements a mockery of the almost-dance Clarice always did when throwing her portals. Nothing she did, nothing she _could_ do, would ever be enough –

 _Ororo, no_. It was the Professor – her Professor – his voice low and urgent in her head. _It’s what they want. Don’t fall into their trap._

She knew it – she knew that was what they were doing, and that she shouldn’t be playing along with it, but her rage and her sorrow were too deep for rationality to touch. Up into the air she went, out of their reach, and now she was the one who mocked them, even as she hit them with bolt after bolt of lightning. Of course it never did become any more effective – all she was doing was draining her energy even faster.

 _Come back, Ororo_ , the Professor said gently. _Erik needs your help._

God help her, she went. She’d never outright abandoned a fight before – but then, this was no ordinary fight. Sentinels were difficult to destroy, but Memories were impossible.

Darkness returned when her attack ebbed, and she landed on the lawn beside Magneto once more. Tears stung on her cheeks, her vision blurring, but she didn’t care enough to wipe them away. How many more of them were going to die? And was Clarice the first, or just the first that she’d heard?

Rogue and Logan had to finish this, before they all died.

\--

Kitty had fallen silent, unwilling or unable to say anything more. She was still breathing, but her breaths were shallow and labored. She was simply too small to have lost so much blood, though at least the bleeding had slowed under the pressure of Erik’s hands.

He’d taken over speaking for her, telling her the few humorous stories he had. He reminded her that there were kittens waiting for them, that they’d have plenty of fuzzy company while they recovered – while they _all_ recovered, for he couldn’t imagine that they were the only ones injured anymore.

“We might be able to end the Cold War, you know,” he said, keeping pressure on her wounds, even though he doubted it was necessary – or effective – anymore. “We’ve become quite good at being harmlessly annoying. We could go to the Kremlin and forge all sorts of peace treaties, and steal all the codes to their nuclear bombs.” He was talking complete nonsense now, but he had to say something. “Were you even alive, during the Cold War? When did it end?”

“Was a baby,” she said, her speech a little slurred. “Don’t remember.”

“I’m sure it only gets more…interesting,” he said. “Humans are by and large insane, after all.”

“So are we,” she muttered, shivering. He didn’t know if it was fear or cold; at this point, it probably didn’t matter. There wasn’t anything he could do about it, either way. “Erik?” she said, her voice faint. “It’s getting dark.”

The lightning-cage was illuminating the yard more effectively than any full moon. Physical darkness was not what she meant.

He shut his eyes. She was going to die. _They_ were going to die, because the Memories had not gone far. The nurse-thing was still watching, listening avidly to their nonsense. He’d throw another fence post at it, if he thought it would do any good. 

His mind screamed at him that this was not how it was supposed to end – that if this goddamn nightmare had to kill them, they should go out in a blaze of glory, or at least destroy something. But bringing down the house would only trap Marie and Logan inside, and he doubted he had the strength to do it, anyway.

“It’s all right, Kitty,” he said, opening his eyes. The stars were very brilliant overhead. “I think it’s getting dark for all of us.”

“Scared,” she said, more softly still.

“I know,” he whispered. “I am, too.”

He felt the exact moment she stopped breathing. Apparently the Memory did, too, because it crept over to them, that hungry look even more pronounced, eyes fixed on Kitty’s hair.

“Do it,” Erik said, weary beyond endurance. “Just get it over with.”

The thing gave him one of its horrible smiles. “No,” it said, and there was something almost playful in its words. It reached out to tuck a strand of Kitty’s hair behind her ear. “You have. So. Much fear. And so much. Pain. Why. Kill you and. Starve. Myself?”

He wanted to attack the damn thing – wanted to drive it to kill him, but he knew there was little point. There would be no driving it, no forcing it to do anything it didn’t care to. Instead he shut his eyes, determined to ignore it until either this ended or he bled to death himself. At this point, he wasn’t sure which was preferable.

\--

There was something wrong – some poison, some contaminant in the well of the Memories’ hive-mind. It was almost unnoticeable, but it was _there_ , and they had no idea how to root it out. They couldn’t do anything about it until they found it, but it darted through their thoughts, elusive and insidious, just enough of a distraction to break the full force of their concentration.

 _Telepaths_ , they thought. The pair could do them no harm, but the fact that they had found a way in at all was not to be borne. Something had to be done about them, and it had to be done…thoroughly.

\--

 _Sharley could feel the itch of the Stranger in her own thoughts, and was certain Marie could, too – she just wasn’t able to recognize it. The Stranger wanted to burn the entire place down, to raze it to the ground and sow metaphorical salt into it. And if she and Marie didn’t hurry, it might just lose its patience. She didn’t have enough energy to force it to wait – not when she was feeding so much of what she_ did _have to Marie, to keep her from passing out from sheer exertion._

_The poor woman didn’t need to know just what kind of toll this was taking on her body, even with her healing factor. Without it, she would have been dead quite a while before now, but even it wasn’t enough. Sharley hadn’t been kidding, when she’d said this could burn a human up from the inside out._

Pull, Marie, _she said, latching herself onto the grandfather-spirit and winding threads to contain the paradox_. Pull. We wipe out this fucker, and we take care of the shit goin’ on outside.

What shit? _Marie asked, faltering – exactly what she needed to not do._

You let me worry about that. Pull, and let’s –

_A massive explosion rocked the floors overhead, sending dust drifting down from the ceiling like snow. Sharley didn’t want to know what had caused it, and she doubted Marie did, either. They had to focus._

_Marie seemed to understand that, too, because she pulled -- and she pulled very hard. The threads tangled among her fingers went taut, stretching a little, but they didn’t snap. Her face went white with pain, but there wasn’t much Sharley could do about that. They just had to get this done._

That’s it. That’s it. Good, Marie.

_It was the grandfather-ghost that screamed now, writhing in its cage of Time, struggling totally ineffectively against the choke-hold Marie had around it. The woman laughed through her own pain, pulling harder still. The Time-lines cut into the thing like razor-wire, tearing through what passed for its skin, and Sharley had to fight a truly horrible urge to laugh at it._

_Marie didn’t bother trying. Her laughter was not vicious, however – it was somehow triumphant and hesitant, as though she couldn’t quite comprehend that it was_ her _doing this, that she was the one wielding so very much power. Giving it up was going to be hell, but they’d burn that bridge when they came to it._

_The grandfather-thing tried to escape, tried to thrash against the cage she held around it, but it wasn’t going anywhere. The man might have thought himself powerful in life – might have been powerful – but he’d never come up against anything like them. He and his victims were all human, and even the most powerful of humans were subjected by the limitations imposed by the fact that they were mortal. He wasn’t now, and neither were they, but even the Memories had no idea how to handle the one-two punch of a group of very powerful living people augmented by herself and the Stranger. They were fucked, and they needed to get that through their heads._

_It screamed yet again, higher this time, and so loud that both Marie and Logan-the-Stranger winced. She had taken on his senses along with his healing factor, and the assault on her ears was almost deafening. At least the Stranger would be hating this as much as Sharley was._

One more pull, Marie. Give it everythin’, all right?

Right.

 _The thing’s screams reached a higher crescendo, and cut off with an abruptness that was a little too satisfying. It went up in a spout of blinding white flame, a light that radiated cold rather than heat, and her own cage of Time-lines kept it in place, trapping the paradox before it could spread out of the basement and affect the world above. It shrank, bit by bit, compressing the light and all that it represented until there was nothing left. The grandfather-creature was not only no more – it had never been. They just needed to tie up the loose ends, literally_.

You tell the Stranger to have fun, she said. Fire purifies. We won’t leave the Memories anywhere to go to ground.

\--

Marie shuddered. Never, ever in her entire goddamn life had she felt like _this._ It wasn’t just the power, the sheer force of the strength that she now held – it wasn’t just what she’d done with it, but what she could _do_ with it. What she was quite certain she would have to do, in some measure, once they were out of this literal hellhole.

“All right, Stranger,” she said, shutting her eyes. She had to let the residue from her efforts pass through her, let it earth itself before it tore her apart. No wonder Sharley had said no mortal thing should hold this sort of power – it really would consume her, if she held onto it for too long. “Sharley says do your thing. We burn and then we get the hell out.”

It looked at her, and she’d swear there was a little of _Logan_ in its eyes again. More than a little: his gaze was still far too alien, but not as wholly as it had been when they first came down here.

“Darlin’,” he said, “it would be our goddamn pleasure.”

 _Damn_ , Sharley said. _There’s no way that thing let him out on its own. He had to have beaten the shit out of it._

“That’s Logan,” Marie said aloud, very dryly. “He does that.”

“Hell yeah I do. You sure there’s not anybody still in this house?”

 _There are_ , Sharley said, _but we’ll fix it all, once we’re topside._

Marie had no idea how the hell that was meant to work, but she’d defer to the…expert, or whatever the hell Sharley actually was. “Sharley says there are, but that we’ll fix it when we get up there. Whatever the hell that even means. Light it up, sugar.”

He gave her a grin that was not quite right, and pulled a Zippo lighter out of his pocket. When he flicked it, the flame sprang up far too tall, brighter than the odd red light around them, and so much more alive. He held it out, well away from his body, and tilted it slightly. “Marie, get behind me,” he said, a strange, almost breathless quality to his voice.

Marie did, mostly because she didn’t think she wanted to actually see what he was about to do. She had a sneaking suspicion it would be the sort of thing she wouldn’t be able to forget, no matter how hard she tried.

As it turned out, she didn’t need to see it. The flash, the soundless explosion, the sudden swell of light that drove away all trace of darkness – that was more than enough. She’d swear she felt her face scorch, and she wasn’t even facing the source of the explosion. The heat was intense, horribly so, and yet it felt…good. Maybe Sharley was right – it did feel like it was cleaning away the intangible nastiness that had gripped her as soon as she’d set foot in this goddamn basement.

 _You get that thing to shift itself while you still can,_ Sharley said. _It’ll stay down here and watch, even if it means Logan’ll burn to death._

Oh, fuck _that_. Marie grabbed his arm, dragging him after her without any option of protest. Sure, he was a lot taller than her, and probably outweighed her by eighty pounds at least, but that didn’t mean she was going to let him fight her on it.

“Pushy today, aren’t you?” he asked, sounding more amused than anything else. “I’m not gonna let that thing keep me down here. Don’t wanna risk dyin’ for real – but I’m not done yet. _It’s_ not done yet.”

 _Of fucking course it’s not_ , Sharley sighed. 

“What else is there to do?” Marie asked, still tugging.

“Have to bring it up with us,” he said. “Basement’s too well-constructed. If we don’t help get that fire up above, it won’t do any good. Gotta burn the whole place down.”

“Sharley says there’s still people in here,” she reiterated.

 _And I said we’d fix it_ , Sharley pointed out. _Some of you already died up topside, out in the yard. Marie, you’re gonna have to let me take over as much as I can up there. You kicked that thing’s ass, but what we need to do takes practice you just don’t have._

“What are we gonna do?” she asked, faltering.

 _We’re gonna raise the dead_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like I said, have faith in me. I won’t kill everyone off forever.


	35. The Other Side

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which the day is saved, the Memories vanquished, the house burned down, and the dead resurrected. For once, shit does not happen (much).

Ororo, the elder Erik, Anathea, and Janek were driven back to the pair of Charleses, slowly but surely. Of Irena and Alfred there was no sign, which could not mean anything good.

The explosion from the upper story had nearly made young Charles fall out of his wheelchair. Whatever Raven and Hank were working on had either gone horribly wrong, or their plans had been insane to begin with. The windows along a good portion of the northern wall blasted outward, flying out of the lightning-cage like glittering, deadly hail.

Ororo deflected the shards, or they might well have killed someone. The advancing Memories certainly didn’t seem to care; they just kept on, inexorable, hardly impeded by anything that any of the living might throw at them.

Kitty was dead. Charles had felt her go – but she had gone alone. Young Erik and Lia were still alive, which could only mean the Memories wanted them so. What he feared now was not that the Memories would kill them all, but that they _wouldn’t_ – not until they begged for it.

He and his elder self had tried. They’d poured everything they could into that horrible hive mind, all the poison and interference they could create, but he had known it wouldn’t be enough. They’d done what they could because they had to, not because they had any hope of success.

The inner windows of the first floor began to glow, lit up with the dancing orange-yellow of a rising fire. Had Logan and Marie succeeded? Or were they dead down there, burning? The mental static between the basement and the surface was still too strong for him to know. Raven and Hank lived, though if they became trapped on the third floor, they wouldn’t stay alive for very long.

“Hey, fuckfaces!” That was _Marie’s_ voice – mostly. There was a strange shift in her accent that was most definitely not her own, and it sounded a touch deeper than usual. “Your maker kicked the bucket. You’re gonna go on ahead and join him, okay?” The sentence might be worded like a question, but it didn’t sound like one.

Surprisingly, the Memories hissed. They turned, all of them, and Charles saw her approaching across the lawn. Logan – and it did appear to be Logan, not Logan-the-Stranger – was following her, radiating a warped kind of amusement.

Even the way she walked wasn’t quite right – she moved like a woman used to being much taller, somehow maintaining an air of stillness even while in motion. Her expression was very Marie, but there was a very odd sort of _glee_ in her eyes – very strange eyes, too. They were still her dark brown, but the left was overlain with what almost looked like a luminescent cataract of green and blue, and the right bore a section of a lighter brown that was nearly orange. Had this Sharley woman left more of a footprint than Marie had let on? Had Marie even _known_ about it? She was clearly awake now, very much still herself, but she was not alone.

“I need you all to hold _really still_ ,” she said, those odd eyes sweeping the living. “I mean, _really_ still.”

“…We’re all about to die, aren’t we?” Anathea asked.

\--

This was beyond bizarre, but Marie could not say she minded. While Sharley couldn’t pull a full-on possession like the Stranger, she could guide Marie’s actions – provided Marie was relaxed enough to let her. _That_ wasn’t an easy thing to do, but she managed it, mostly because she had to. Sharley hadn’t let her down so far.

However, she had also not, until now, allowed Marie to fully see things as she did. There was more to it than the ghost-images, than the Time-lines: Marie saw them in the abstract, but Sharley knew how to link them, to read and understand and manipulate them with a speed and a thoroughness it might have taken Marie decades to learn.

It wasn’t just that they all had threads, the Memories and the living. They each had more than one, coiling around them in a swooping, surreal dance, never touching one another. Some were thick as cables, while others were so hair-fine that only her heightened sense of sight would have noticed them. She couldn’t imagine seeing the world like this _all the time_ – but then, Sharley wasn’t human. Her vision probably worked a little differently.

Behind her, she could feel the fire rise through the house, climbing from floor to floor. Hank and Raven had lines, too, floating down through the upper window like spider-silk, and she grabbed them first – or rather, Sharley grabbed them, and Marie let her arms be guided. It was one of the weirdest things she’d ever felt in her life, because it wasn’t any kind of possession she’d ever imagined: she could have fought it, if she’d chosen. Unlike with the Stranger, she wasn’t any kind of puppet. She was fully aware when she caught the threads, letting them wind around her fingers like a one-handed cat’s-cradle.

What happened next was, somehow, even weirder. She might not have a clue in hell what she was doing, but Sharley did, and an echo of that knowledge…passed between their minds, in a manner of speaking. Marie couldn’t have explained it if she tried, but she had a suspicion Sharley couldn’t have, either. Some things transcended words.

The Time-lines glowed momentarily brighter, their odd pulse quickening, and it passed around and through her like some strange equivalent of an electrical current. It fought with her own pulse, trying to take it over (and possibly kill her), but Sharley calmed it, drawing it into whatever of her consciousness lived in Marie’s head.

She saw Hank and Raven fighting their way down a corridor, coughing, almost overwhelmed by the smoke – but she also saw them trying to jump out the window. Both potentialities ended in death, and for a second she froze, panicking.

 _Chill_ , Sharley said. _I’ve got this._

The Time-lines…blurred – another thing Marie couldn’t possibly have put words around – and the trapped pair was on the lawn, right beside Ororo. They looked confused as hell, but they were alive and, so far as Marie could tell, unharmed.

“What the hell?” Hank demanded, shaking himself. He reeked like smoke, and both his shirt and his fur were singed in places.

“Don’t ask,” Anathea muttered. “I think maybe we should be ducking. Or running.” 

The entire lot of them tried to do some variation of both, backing away from Marie and Logan. She wondered, briefly, if she ought to tell them not to run, but whatever they were doing, running was not it.

“You. Should. Not be here,” a Memory said – he’d been just a boy when he’d died, a kid of maybe eighteen in a khaki soldier’s uniform. It was staring hard at Marie, and if she’d been on her own, she might have frozen like a rat before a snake.

“Neither should you,” Sharley said through her. “We’re both goin’ home. Deal with you there, where you belong.”

The Memory tilted its head to one side, curious and uneasy, and Marie’s arm lifted again to catch its Time-lines. They were entirely unlike the lines of either the living or the inanimate: the Memories’ Time was entirely black, and she could see neither their past nor their future. They were, she was pretty sure, complete abominations, so much so that Time itself didn’t know what to make of them.

“All right, kids,” she said, wincing at the sting on her fingers. _That_ was just wrong; nothing else she’d yet done had hurt, but even touching these lines hurt her.

 _Sorry, Marie_ , Sharley said. _Nothin’ I can do about it, except get this over quick._

What she did was far more complex than the destruction of the grandfather- thing had been. That had taken brute strength, such as Marie hadn’t thought she had in her. This was a more delicate process, the threads weaving with one another in a way she was pretty sure couldn’t actually be natural. Since there was nothing at all natural about the Memories, that only made sense, really.

A surge of Sharley’s odd power passed through her, buoying her into outright euphoria as her fingers danced through the threads. The present phased itself into transparency, vying with the past and the dozens of potential futures – it was far too much for her eyes, but Sharley must have known what she was doing. The threads whispered over one another as they stretched out to the dead, even as more wound around the Memories in a luminescent cocoon. This wasn’t what they’d done to the grandfather- thing: it was almost exactly the reverse, in fact. They didn’t pull, but neither did they squeeze. It was a cage that they formed, a cage that didn’t actually drain anything.

 _Why can’t we wipe them out of history, too?_ Marie asked, right before she sucked in a deep, startled breath. Something entirely new shot through her like a javelin – energy totally unlike anything she’d yet felt, which was really saying something. She didn’t see Clarice open her eyes, but she _felt_ it, just as she felt the first breath Kitty took. Flashes of their deaths flickered through her mind, mercifully brief, but still nearly enough to make her sick.

 _Memories aren’t subject to Time_ , Sharley said. _In all my life I’ve known one person who could actually get rid of ’em, and I’m sure as hell not her. You and me, we’re gonna drag ’em back to the Other. Stranger can open the way._

“What, now?” Marie said aloud.

_Now. Before the fuckers figure out how to fight their way free._

“Great,” Marie muttered. “Stranger, Sharley says you need to open up the Other, so we can shove these assholes in. And that you’ve gotta do it now.”

For a moment, Logan’s expression shifted, the animation draining from his face and replaced by the Stranger’s inhuman calculation. Marie wondered if the opening would be a physical thing, something the rest of them could actually see –

It was, and very startlingly so. Something very like one of Clarice’s portals winked into life at the edge of the lawn, but much, much bigger – it was easily the height and width of the house, and it opened straight into the dry, metallic heat of the Other. Somehow, seeing that dull red sky, juxtaposed with their own world’s stars, managed to be even more surreal than anything else she’d yet seen. Two worlds that should not, by any rationality, be anywhere near one another, sitting side-by-side to draw in the Memories.

“Okay, Stranger,” Sharley said, again hijacking Marie’s voice. “Get ’em home and call real me. Tell her what’s happened out here.”

Logan-the-Stranger’s eyebrow arched -- a small tick that was definitely all Logan. “She’ll find all this fascinating, I’m sure.”

Marie honestly wasn’t certain if it was her or Sharley who laughed at that. It might have been both. Sharley pulled the Memories around, one by one, dragging them like animals on a leash. The really, really weird thing was that they weren’t struggling all that much – Marie would have expected them to be thrashing around like anything, trying to break their Time-prisons, but they were disturbingly placid. Had Sharley done something to them?

 _Not me_ , Sharley said. _This is their first taste of what oughtta be home. You gotta understand, these Memories? They’re fuckin’ stupid. If they were anythin’ like the ones in the Other, you’d have all been dead within ten minutes. These assholes are about to meet the part of their family that’s got actual brains._

Marie really, really wished she could witness _that_ meeting. “Then let’s start the family reunion,” she said aloud, unabashed glee in her voice as she let Sharley guide her hands. She’d tuck away the idea of Memories even worse than these for later, preferably when she had Logan and a few kittens to hug. “All right, fuckers. In you go.”

\--

Kitty’s sudden, harsh inhalation startled Erik so much that it almost gave him heart failure.

“…the fuck?” she demanded, coughing. He actually felt her heart kick back into beating beneath his hand: it was slow at first, but it rapidly picked up speed, until it was hammering away. The wounds under his fingers were no longer raw, either; they were heavily scabbed over. He traced the worst of them, and found that the ends actually felt like new scar tissue.

Kitty twitched. “That tickles,” she grumbled. “I’m pretty sure I was just dead.”

“I’m pretty sure you were, too,” he said, troubled by how incredibly relieved he was to find that, however the hell it had happened, she was most definitely _not_ dead now. 

“Any ideas why I’m not now?” she asked, sounding a little plaintive.

“No, and I don’t care why, or how, as long as you keep breathing. Does your back still hurt?” His fingers were exploring her other wounds, and they all felt the same as the first – he’d swear they’d been healing far longer than was actually possible.

“Like a bitch. Seriously, that tickles.” She squirmed, trying to shy away, stifling involuntary laughter. “What the hell are you even doing?”

“Oh, hold still,” he griped, rolling his eyes. “Your cuts have all healed much faster than they should, and I have no idea why.”

She sat up a little, trying not to put any weight on his injured chest, and gave him a rather unimpressed look. “Dude, I just came back from the dead. I think that beats a few scabs in the ‘this is fucking weird and impossible’ contest. How’s your chest?”

“It hurts. Please don’t rip the bandages off yet.” Strangely, though, the pain was not the same as it had been even minutes ago. That had been deep, sharp, and very immediate; this was still deep, but much duller, and for some damn reason, it was beginning to itch.

“No, I thought I’d peel them off to see if your guts would fall out,” she said, trying to sit all the way up and inadvertently kneeing him in the stomach. “Sorry,” she said, wincing when he twitched. “You think you could get up?”

“Maybe, but I’m not sure it’s --”

“Holy _shit!_ ” Kitty yelped, almost falling over backward.

Erik grabbed her on instinct, which of course just brought her elbow right down onto his chest. It hurt so much that he didn’t at first register the hellish red light that lit up the entire yard, light that had nothing to do with the fire growing steadily larger within the mansion. He turned his head, and almost swallowed his tongue when he saw the entire group of Memories staggering across the lawn. The things weren’t headed straight toward them, but their trajectory was close enough to be completely terrifying.

Their strange, stilted movements weren’t quite right, though – oh, they’d always moved completely weirdly, but there was something different about it this time. It was almost as though they were being played like marionettes, shoved and dragged at the same time, forced into the metallic heat he recognized as the Other from Sharley’s memory.

It certainly didn’t look like they were capable of attacking, but he froze anyway, his grip on Kitty’s arm so hard it had to hurt. Beside him, he could feel Lia curling into a ball, her knees hitting his side and sending pain exploding through his entire midsection.

“Move now,” Kitty whispered, her eyes huge. 

“I don’t think we need to,” he whispered back. He wasn’t sure he could have even if they _did_ need to; aside from his chest, his back had entirely stiffened up from lying on that damn root.

“If we get eaten again, it’s all your fault,” she muttered. The first of the Memories stumbled through the portal, tripping over the uneven, grassy ground. It didn’t stop, though, nor did the others behind it.

“Technically, none of us were eaten in the first place,” Erik pointed out, watching them with a mix of curiosity and utter terror.

She tore her gaze away from the shambling group and looked down at him. “I’ll eat _you_ , if you don’t get up so we can run the fuck away.”

He snorted, looked her dead in the eye, and said, quite solemnly, “That’s what she said.”

For just a second, she stared at him as though he’d lost his mind – and then she burst out laughing.

“What’s so funny?”

It was Clarice, who was also very much alive, staggering across the lawn almost in a daze. She was obviously in pain, but she didn’t look like she was in danger of keeling over and dying again.

“That’s what she said,” Kitty echoed, forcing the words out through her laughter.

Erik gave up. He could take no more of the horrible, gut-wrenching tension that had torn at him – at all of them – since they reached France, and he started laughing before he could help it. It felt like some terrible, twisted knot in his chest unraveled, and though it didn’t lessen his pain at all, it made it more bearable.

“That’s just not fair,” Clarice grumbled, stumbling over to them and collapsing to her knees. “I get murdered, and you two get to sit here and laugh it up.”

“Hey, I kicked the bucket too, you know,” Kitty said. “Although I don’t think he did. Erik, did you actually die?”

“I can’t say that I did. Though I spent a while wishing I would.” Now that Kitty was alive and breathing again, he absolutely was not going to tell her that there was more than one reason why. Nope. Not happening.

“Hah,” Kitty said. “I win.”

“Win _what_?” he asked.

She paused. “I don’t know. But I win it.”

Erik shook his head. “You’re absolutely insane. You know that, right?”

Kitty snorted, and tried to sit up all the way. “Pot, this is kettle,” she said. “We need to have a discussion about your hue value.”

Clarice, who had all but fallen on her face by now, snickered. “I win too, you know. Whatever it is we won.”

“Kittens,” Kitty said decisively. “We won kittens. Are you going to let me sit up already?” she added, giving Erik as much of a glower as she seemed capable of.

He paused, internally debating. “No,” he said. “You’re warm, and I’ve lost so much blood I’m cold.” It wasn’t entirely a lie, either.

Kitty shrugged. “Fair enough,” she said, and eased herself back down, this time careful not to jab him in the ribs. “I’m tired as hell anyway. I apologize in advance if I drool on you.”

“With all this blood, I doubt I’d notice.”

\--

Logan felt the exact moment the Stranger fully disengaged from his mind. It was a big fat fucking relief, because goddamn was that thing _pushy_. It hadn’t wanted to leave him aware of anything, but Marie was right – he was a stubborn bastard, and he wasn’t going to let some ancient, maybe-demonic-maybe-divine entity take over his head entirely. 

Of course, that meant he was excruciatingly aware of the fact that there was something totally alien taking up space in his brain, and for some reason, it really, really _itched._ Having it leave was like someone pressed a cool compress to his mind, and he heaved an audible sigh of relief.

He watched Marie/Sharley work, completely fascinated. He was goddamn proud of her, his Marie, who in that moment looked something more than human – well, she _was_ something more than human, literally, at least for the moment. He and the Stranger may have helped her, but she might well have just saved the damn world.

Beside them, some floor collapsed within the house. The fire had fed and grown, and it would only be a matter of time now before it started consuming the outer walls. Ororo had packed away her lightning-cage, since it obviously wasn’t needed anymore, and an anxiety he hadn’t known he carried suddenly eased within his gut. By the time they were done, nothing would be left of this evil place.

As soon as the last of the Memories had crossed the portal’s threshold, it snapped shut behind them, leaving unbroken night and a sudden, almost deafening silence. Nobody moved, and nobody spoke, because really, what on Earth could be said, after all that?

Logan tapped Marie on the shoulder. “Hey Sharley, take a break for a minute, would you?”

Marie blinked, but Sharley must have listened, because that odd sheen drained from her eyes, leaving them wholly Marie’s warm brown.

“Thanks, lady,” he said, and bent his head to kiss her. It was a brief thing, fleeting, just long enough for him to pull back before her mutation could kick in. She tasted like smoke and salt and _Marie_ , and he wished like hell that he could make it linger.

Her face went absolutely scarlet, her expression momentarily shy. He could practically _see_ her thinking _fuck it_ , before she grabbed his collar and pulled him down for another kiss – just as brief, but also strangely satisfying.

“Ahem,” Ororo said. “Save it until we get back home, you two.”

Logan looked at her. She was absolutely exhausted, her skin streaked with sweat and soot – he couldn’t tease her in good conscience. Not right now. 

“Fine,” he said. “But just ’cause you asked so nicely.”

Marie started giggling, resting her forehead against his chest. Now that the urgency of the moment had passed, she too looked dead on her feet.

“Come on, darlin’,” he said, picking her up. “Who the hell’s drivin’ this bus home?”

“Not you,” Hank muttered. He was checking the rest of them over, on what Logan suspected was total auto-pilot. “Did that really all just happen?”

“Yes,” the young Professor said. His face was actually grey, dripping with sweat, and he looked about three steps away from passing out entirely. “Yes it did. Unfortunately. I think I’d like to go home now.”

“You and me both,” Logan muttered. “Let’s get the fuck outta here before the cops show up.”

“That’s what she said.” Clarice, battered, bruised, and limping badly, was approaching across the lawn. “Though maybe not in that order.”

A smile like a sunbeam broke over the young Professor’s face. “I thought you’d died,” he said. “I felt you die.”

“She did,” Ororo confirmed, staring at Clarice as though not quite able to believe the evidence of her own eyes. “Marie, did you do this?”

“Sharley did,” Marie said. “She said we’d raise the dead. She sorta…I dunno how she did it, but she rewound Time around ’em.”

 _I can’t really fix their injuries_ , Sharley said, stirring long enough to speak. _Nothin’ really fixes Memory-wounds but time. They’re not lethal anymore, but all of you that have ’em need to be careful a while._

“Aaand apparently you still need to relax, though,” Marie added. “You’re not gonna die, but you’re not healed up.”

“Think I figured that out for myself,” Clarice winced, coming to a halt and pressing a hand against her side. “Once my guts are healed up, I need a drink. Right now I’d settle for a kitten.”

“You’re not drinking a kitten, Clarice. That’s disgusting.” Kitty was leaning on the young Magneto, who appeared to be trying to support her. Considering he could barely walk straight himself, that was working about as ineffectively as could be expected. “Can we blow this Popsicle stand already? Actually, Popsicles sound really good right now. Can we get some of those, too?”

“…Actually, I think I could go for that, too,” Hank said, rubbing the back of his neck.

“What are Popsicles?” Anathea asked.

“Well, that clinches it,” Clarice said. “We have to get some now.”

“What the hell just happened?” Trask piped up. He’d evidently decided that sitting down was preferable to trying to stay on his feet, and had parked himself beside the elder Professor’s chair. He looked dazed, his eyes unfocused. Poor bastard – he probably could have stayed in the facility after all. At least he hadn’t played dead weight for too long.

“My girl just saved the world,” Logan said, wrapping an arm around Marie’s shoulders. “Too bad you aren’t gonna remember it later. Think we need to get this asshole back where he came from, before any Popsicles happen.”

“Dammit,” Kitty muttered.

\--

In the end, to Charles’s intense relief, Hank drove.

He himself was exhausted, head pounding and desperately thirsty. Fortunately, the bus had air conditioning, and he shut his eyes in relief when the cool air washed over him.

Logan and Marie had taken up one of the seats, leaning against one another while he stroked her hair. Charles had no real idea just what had happened in that basement, and he was hardly going to ask – oh, he was curious, but some things were meant to stay private. He suspected the pair of them couldn’t have explained it if they’d tried.

Raven, her guard for once lowered, had curled up on another seat and fallen asleep. Clarice had taken the one across from her, and winced every time they hit a rough patch on the road. She looked much more awake than almost anyone else, and Charles wondered if it was because she’d spent a while dead.

 _And that is not a sentence I ever expected to think_ , he said to himself. But then, Kitty had died, too, and she was sound asleep, curled up much like an actual cat with her head beneath Erik’s chin. The pair of them did appear to be an actual…something, so Charles supposed he ought to get used to the idea. No matter how much it unnerved him. Erik himself was dozing, hanging onto Kitty like a child with a stuffed animal, and Charles was going to cut _that_ analogy short right there. 

Both his and Erik’s elder selves seemed rather less tired than the rest of them, which just wasn’t fair. Charles knew they’d done just as much as everyone else, and he wondered if all they’d endured in that bad future had somehow inured them to the kind of fatigue faced by normal mortals. They’d all altered things to such an extent that he hoped none of them would ever have to find out.

The bus hit yet another pothole when they reached the onramp to the highway, and Clarice let out an irritated groan. “Fuck this,” she muttered, and started singing, slightly off-key. “The wheels on the bus go round and round, round and round, round and round.”

“The wheels on the bus go round and round, all around the town.” To Charles’s shock, that was _Raven_ , who was apparently not as asleep as he’d thought.

Marie choked. “The door on the bus goes open and shut, open and shut, open and shut,” she sang.

Kitty stirred. “The wipers on the bus go swish, swish, swish,” she mumbled.

“Swish, swish, swish,” Ororo contributed.

“The wipers on the bus go swish, swish, swish,” Clarice snickered. “All around the town.”

“The horn on the bus goes beep, beep, beep.” It seemed even Hank was getting into the spirit.

“Beep, beep, beep,” Clarice and Raven sang at once.

“The horn on the bus goes beep, beep, beep,” Kitty reiterated. “All around the town.”

“The people on the bus go up and down,” Clarice added. “Up and down, up and down.”

Erik cracked open an eye. “That’s what she said.”

Clarice burst out laughing, and she wasn’t the only one. Even Charles himself couldn’t help it – the entire thing was too absurd. Rather like Trask, he was wondering just what in the hell had just happened back there, and he’d been sober. Now they were singing children’s songs. It really said everything anyone could possibly need to know about this group.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Told you to have faith in me. We’re entering the home stretch with this fic, but don’t worry – I have sequel ideas.


	36. Exhaustion and Awkwardness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which the wounded and weary are tended to, much snark is had all around, and everybody just wants to go the hell home.

Trask, freshly memory-wiped, was safely delivered back to his institution. It was obvious that the orderly wanted to ask why the hell he stank like smoke, but no information was forthcoming, so the young man just shook his head and took his charge back inside.

“Popsicles,” Kitty mumbled. “Now.”

Logan doubted she’d be awake long enough to enjoy one, but Anathea and her crew looked like a group of hopeful puppies – well, all but Albert, who was an unconscious lump on the floor. Even poor Lia looked a little brighter at the idea.

“You’re quite demanding, for a tiny person,” Erik said. He sounded only half awake himself.

“Quiet, you,” Kitty said. “I can totally punch you in the chest.”

“But you won’t,” he retorted. “First of all, you’d have to sit up, and second of all, if you really wanted to hurt me you’d have done it by now.”

“Jerk,” Kitty muttered, the word muffled a little by his shoulder.

“Bitch,” he returned, but he said it fondly, which was just _wrong_. No matter how much Logan tried to get used to them being…well, _them_ , he still couldn’t manage it. At least he didn’t seem to be alone in that. 

Tired though he was, he wasn’t having a problem keeping his eyes open. Hosting the Stranger had been draining beyond belief, but he was still cruising on adrenaline. Realistically, they were probably going to have to spend the night somewhere, since there was no way Hank was in any condition for another six-hour flight. Somebody would have to look in on the kittens, though, to make sure the little furballs hadn’t flipped over their water dish or something. He sure as hell didn’t want to try to _sleep_ on the plane – the needed a couple hotel rooms. More than a couple, since he also didn’t want a repeat of their last, incredibly crowded stay in a too-small room.

Much as he wanted to get Marie alone, it was too soon. They both needed rest, and he simply didn’t have all the supplies he wanted. He hadn’t been kidding about hitting up a fabric store back home: if they were going to do this, they were going to do it _right_ , dammit. Plenty of time, plenty of space, and definitely plenty of privacy. He doubted Marie had much experience in that department, and the last thing he wanted to do was scare her, or make her uncomfortable. They’d take this at her pace, no matter how long it took to get there.

Ahead of him, Clarice shifted in her seat, wincing. They needed medical supplies, too, and some real food – Popsicles weren’t exactly filling. He hoped he wasn’t the only one awake enough to deal with all that, because he really didn’t want to have to do it alone. Looking around the bus told him he might just have to.

“Need to see the kittens,” Clarice said, touching her abdomen and grimacing. “Kittens first, Popsicles later.”

“Nuh-uh,” Kitty mumbled.

Logan rolled his eyes. “Kitty, I’m gonna need your help with that. If I just open the door, the damn things might stampede me.”

Evidently that mental image was too much for Ororo, who gave him a tired laugh. “I’d pay to see that,” she said. 

“I’ll just portal in,” Clarice said, before Kitty could respond. “Just to make sure.”

“Be careful, okay?” Marie asked sleepily. “You _did_ just have your guts rearranged. Sharley said you’re not all exactly healed, and won’t be for a while.”

“I know, I know,” Clarice sighed. “I’ll just hop in and pet a few. Poor things have to be so confused on their own.”

“They’re kittens, not children,” Logan grumbled.

“Bit your tongue,” Kitty said, the words an almost indecipherable mutter. “They’re our babies.”

Now it was Erik who rolled his eyes. “Go the fuck to sleep already.” 

\--

Charles couldn’t quite grasp the fact that it was all over. It was _over_ , and they were soon to go home. What they were going to do then he had no idea, and just now, he couldn’t be bothered to care in the slightest. Whatever nightmares might follow would be the ordinary reaction of people exposed to horrible things, without any supernatural influence behind them. They could actually build lives now.

True, it was going to be difficult: Alfred was still technically alive, and they really ought to see if Kitty could put his heart back. Out of the entire group, Charles and Hank were the only two who legally existed, though he was certain Raven had a whole host of ID’s tailored to her. Erik was too recognizable (and too notorious) to use any that he might have hidden away.

A false ID was easy enough to make, but fabricating an entire background was much more difficult. Anathea and her people might never be able to cope with living outside the mansion, and he doubted many of the others would _want_ to. The mansion as it was now might not be the school they had all been used to in the future, but the entire group from the future counted at as ‘home’ within their minds. That was probably a good thing, because if he was truly to rebuild the school, he’d need all the help he could get.

Hank turned the bus into the car park of a large supermarket, where they discovered a slight problem: nobody had any actual cash. The task of acquiring Popsicles (and all the other food they’d need) fell to Charles and his credit card, a thing he could have done without. At least Logan and Ororo were willing to go with him.

“I could sleep for the next year,” Ororo said, dropping things in the trolley seemingly at random. At least it was late enough that there were few people around to see what she – what _all_ of them – looked like at the moment.

“Me too,” Logan said. “After I eat an entire damn cow, anyway. We’re gonna need at least three hotel rooms, if we can even find a hotel open at this time of night.”

“It’s Paris,” Charles said. “Truly the city that never sleeps. Throw enough money at the concierge and they’re willing to overlook any manner of oddities.” Granted, this group looked very odd indeed, but still. He could more than afford it.

He looked at their cart. An entire case of Perrier sparkling water, eight loaves of bread, four jars of peanut butter and jam, a pound of beef and a pound of turkey from the deli, and a fifth of very expensive bourbon. It also held enough boxes of medical gauze to patch up a small army, and an assortment of antiseptic creams. He was quite sure Logan would have grabbed an actual suture kit, had one actually been available. Toothbrushes, toothpaste, dental floss, and a large bottle of paracetamol rounded out the purchase.

They saved the Popsicles for last, so that they wouldn’t be a melted mess by the time they reached the bus again. Charles couldn’t actually remember the last time he had a Popsicle, and the extent to which he looked forward to one was almost pathetic.

Half the bus’s occupants were asleep by the time they made it outside, but they stirred when the groceries were loaded. Logan ripped into the flat of water and passed the bottles around, and the sound of sixteen people guzzling as though their lives depended on it was so absurdly hilarious that Charles almost choked.

Logan, who had downed his bottle in about thirty second flat, let out an extremely impressive belch that actually echoed down the length of the bus. None of his companions from the future looked remotely surprised, but it made Hank shoot his own water out his nose.

“Nice,” Marie said. “Hank, you’re not gonna choke to death up there, are you?”

Hank gave her a vague wave that was probably meant to be reassuring. Unfortunately, he was coughing so hard that the gesture was mostly pointless.

“Spit it out,” Logan said, thumping him on the back. “Unless you want me to drive.”

“ _No!_ ” That was almost everybody on the bus, somehow achieving perfect unison.

It might have been sheer panic that allowed Hank to cough up all the water he’d inhaled. He might well have shaved off all his fur, if it would keep Logan from driving anything ever again.

“Thought so,” Logan grinned. “All right, children, we have Popsicles.”

“Clarice, gimme a grape one,” Kitty said, reaching out and making a one-armed grabby-hand in the general direction of the grocery box.

“Don’t you dare drip that on me,” Erik warned.

“Can’t make any promises.” When Clarice handed her a Popsicle, she sat up as much as Erik would actually let her, and tore the wrapper off with her teeth. There was something worryingly feral about the action.

“Charming,” Erik said dryly. He let her sit up properly, though with obvious reluctance to actually relinquish his hold on her.

_Wrong_ , Charles thought. _So very, very wrong_. He accepted a cherry Popsicle, and was quite surprised at how much it soothed him. The incredibly artificial flavor was somehow calming, and though it didn’t make him any less weary, he felt himself relaxing in spite of everything.

Once they’d all settled – more or less – Hank pulled out onto the road again, trying to steer with one hand so he could eat his own Popsicle. For a few moments, there was no sound but quite a bit of slurping.

“We sound like feeding time at the goddamn dolphin exhibit at Sea World,” Clarice observed. 

Marie giggled. “Slurp, slurp.”

“That’s what she said,” Erik and Kitty retorted in unison.

Raven dissolved into helpless laughter, and Clarice was not far behind. Ororo just covered her face with her free hand. “What is _wrong_ with you all?”

“I don’t think you’ve got any kinda reasonable ground to ask that question,” Logan said. “Especially not with teeth that orange.”

Charles hazarded a glance at his elder self. Even through his obvious exhaustion, he looked amused. Then again, Ororo’s teeth really were fantastically orange.

\--

Erik was quite happy to use his mangled chest as an excuse to avoid lugging all those groceries into the hotel. Everybody who hadn’t been sliced into ribbons could deal with that, thank you very much.

Clarice was still going on about checking on the kittens, but nobody else seemed willing to go with her. He had an unfortunate suspicion that she was going to steal the bus once they were all inside, and probably fall asleep at the wheel. If she wanted to deal with it _that_ badly, she could portal herself there, and not wreck their only vehicle.

As he’d feared, Kitty had indeed dripped Popsicle all over what was left of his shirt. Given that the shirt mostly consisted of shreds and bloodstains, he supposed he didn’t have much right to be too annoyed, but still. Blood dried; Popsicle residue just got…sticky.

“Wake up,” he said, giving her a little shake. “We’ve landed.”

Kitty groaned. “Goddammit, I was actually asleep,” she grumbled. “Where did we land?”

“A halfway decent hotel, fortunately. Move it – I need to look at your back, before you pass out again.”

She hauled herself to her feet with no small amount of difficulty, and immediately almost lost her footing. Her legs had probably fallen asleep, curled up as she’d been, and she glowered at him. “Move it, he said,” she muttered. “It’ll be fun, he said.”

“I never said it would be _fun_ ,” he said, with a tinge of asperity. “Just necessary. I need to grab some of the first aid supplies.”

He’d barely finished speaking before Logan threw a box of gauze-rolls at him, followed immediately by a large tube of antibiotic ointment. He managed to catch the first, but the second hit him right in the chest – which of course sent a sharp jag of pain through his entire body. He glared at Logan, who looked completely unrepentant. 

“Don’t do anythin’ I wouldn’t do,” Logan said, stepping out of the bus.

“What does that leave?” Kitty asked, mostly of herself. “Quilting and figure-skating?”

The mental image of Logan trying to figure-skate was so ridiculous that Erik couldn’t help but laugh. “Thank you for that,” he said dryly. “Because I needed to picture Logan in a spangly leotard.” 

Kitty burst out laughing, even as she hopped toward the front of the bus. “I do what I can,” she said. “Just give me a second, will you.”

“Oh, for God’s sake.” He shoved the bandages and antibiotic ointment into her arms and picked her up, ignoring her startled (and somewhat pained) yelp. “It’ll be morning before we even reach the door.”

“…Ow,” she said, shooting him a dirty look. “Little warning next time?”

“I doubt it.” He followed the others down the walkway, grimacing at the stickiness of the remains of that damned Popsicle. He had to wonder just what in the hell they looked like, this pair of people streaked with half-dried gore, and hoped nobody would be stupid enough to comment. Honestly, he was too tired to bother murdering someone right now.

The room wasn’t fancy, but it was quiet and clean, and the bathroom had enough towels to clean out far more wounds than either of them had. Erik could easily deal with his own, but Kitty couldn’t, and he was curious to see if hers had healed to the extent he suspected.

“Wash up,” he said, once he’d let her back down on her feet in the bathroom doorway, “and take off your shirt. I need to look at your back.”

Kitty looked at him, quirking an eyebrow. “Whoa there, sailor,” she said. “Pretty sure you’re supposed to at least buy me a drink first.”

“Oh, shut up and wash your face,” he said, trying not to laugh. “You look like you’re wearing a Halloween mask.”

“Yeah, that’s not _my_ blood,” she pointed out, rinsing her filthy hands under the tap before reaching for a washcloth. Unfortunately, all the linens were white, which meant the cleaning staff was in for a nasty shock tomorrow.

“Thank you for reminding me,” he muttered, opening the box of gauze. He didn’t dare touch anything until he’d washed his own hands, which he had to shove Kitty out of the way to accomplish. The sink was splashed with streaks of red and rust, and somehow, the sight of it was more nauseating than anything he’d yet encountered tonight. 

“Dude, are you okay?” Kitty asked, peering up at him with deep concern. “You’re really pale.”

“I _did_ lose several pints of blood,” he pointed out, giving himself a mental shake. He couldn’t afford to get sick now.

She winced. “Right. You probably should have eaten more than a couple Popsicles. Just saying.”

“I’ll be fine,” he grumbled, both irritated and obscurely uncomfortable. “Shirt. Off.” It wasn’t as though there was much to remove anyway, thanks to the Memories’ claws, but there was enough to get in the way.

“Somebody’s feeling bossy.” She tried to weasel her way out of the thing, and only succeeded in getting her left arm stuck. “Little help?”

“I think that might be an entirely new level of ineptitude,” Erik said, shaking his head. He was somewhat hesitant to help her, and he wasn’t quite sure why. He’d spent much of the night trying – and failing – to keep her from bleeding to death with nothing but his hands. Touching her now should not be so unsettling. “Hold still.”

She hissed in pain when he pulled the thing over her head, and he fought a wince. Her back was a mess of blood, scabs, and what looked for all the world like brand-new scar tissue. She still had pieces of a ruinous sports bra, but he wasn’t about to ask her to remove _that_. He’d rather not get punched in the chest, thank you very much.

“Bad?” she asked, looking at him over her shoulder.

“Worse,” Erik said. “I doubt I need to tell you this is going to hurt.” He soaked a clean washcloth under the tap, wrung it out, and wiped at the first of the cuts as gently as he could.

Kitty hissed again. “Mother fuckin’, titty suckin’, two-balled _bitch!_ ” she growled, automatically shying away. 

Erik looked down at her – well, at the top of her head – and burst out laughing before he knew what he was doing. “I don’t think I’ve heard that one before,” he said, dabbing at her wound again.

“It’s from a movie that hasn’t come out yet,” she explained, shying away a second time. “I thought it was appropriate.”

Privately, he had to agree. “Be that as it may, you really do need to hold still, or I’ll never get this done.”

“I know, I know,” she said, only to flinch away a third time. This was getting them nowhere.

“I think I have a better idea,” he said, momentarily abandoning her to turn on the shower. He tried to set the water to something that wouldn’t burn the cuts, but wouldn’t freeze her, either.

“Whoa, whoa, what the – dude, I don’t have any spare clothes,” she protested, even as he half-dragged her across the floor.

“I think you’ll live,” he said, and shoved her under the spray.

She screeched like a mashed cat, but he was savvy enough to expect the blow she tried to aim at his chest. At least he’d been mostly right about the water temperature: it wasn’t hot, but it wasn’t frigid, either. He thought it actually felt pretty good, but Kitty clearly did not agree.

“This will only take longer if you struggle,” he said, trying to dab at her back with the washcloth and avoid getting smacked at the same time.

She paused, and turned to shoot him an incredulous look. “That,” she said, “sounds so, so, so wrong.” She barely managed to finish the sentence before she cracked up entirely, sputtering when the water hit her in the face.

As much as Erik wanted to protest…she had a point. “You know what I meant,” he said, carefully washing the worst of the cuts. At least she _finally_ held still, even if her continued giggling made his job slightly more difficult. 

As he’d suspected, the injuries looked far older than they actually were. Only the deepest of them oozed upon its introduction to water: the rest really were just a combination of scabs and scars. Still, they had to be cleaned and properly bandaged, or she’d risk sepsis.

“Done yet?” she asked, her tone suggesting she knew full well that he wasn’t.

“I’ll tell you when I’m done. In case you’d forgotten, you _did_ get your entire back sliced like a package of bacon,” he said, trying to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. He knew this probably did really hurt, and she was at least trying to hold still. Somehow, with the worst of the blood washed away, the cuts looked even worse – it was much more obvious just how deep they actually were. No wonder they’d killed her.

“Oh, trust me, I hadn’t forgotten,” she hissed, through gritted teeth. “How long was I – ouch! – dead for, anyway?”

Erik paused. “Too long,” he said quietly. “Don’t you ever do that again, by the way.”

Again she tried to turn to look at him. “Do what?”

“Die on me,” he said, and he had to force himself to meet her eyes. “Once was enough.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” she said, giving him a somewhat strange look before turning away again. “Though speaking of sliced meat, we need to look at your chest.”

“ _I_ need to look at my chest,” he corrected. “I don’t need your help.”

“Well, you’re getting it,” she retorted, tensing when the washcloth hit a particularly sensitive patch of scab. “It won’t sting enough if I let you do it on your own.”

Erik snorted, rinsing away the last of the blood. Her hair remained a bloody, sweaty tangle, though, so he shoved her head forward into the spray, soaking it thoroughly.

“What the – !” Kitty yelped, spluttering. She glared at him over her shoulder, looking very much like, well, a wet, pissed-off cat. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Washing your hair, if you’ll shut up long enough to let me do it,” he retorted. The tiny hotel-sized bottle of shampoo probably wasn’t enough, but it was better than nothing. “Turn your head, will you? Otherwise this will all go in your eyes.”

“…Right,” she said, but she didn’t actually protest. When he worked the shampoo into her hair, he’d swear she actually purred. Unfortunately, that suddenly made him wish the water was much colder.

Well. This was a problem.

He focused on her injuries, since there was nothing at all pleasant about _those_. They were as effective a mood-killer as anything he’d ever seen. Hopefully that would stick, or he had no idea what he was going to do. Well, other than potentially get punched in the chest.

“Shut your eyes,” he ordered, tilting her head forward again to rinse her hair. She spluttered again, wiping at her face; she turned around before he was fully done, stepping back under the spray and letting the rest of the shampoo rinse out.

“You didn’t shut your eyes, did you?” Erik asked, arching an eyebrow.

“I sort of did,” she retorted, rubbing her eyes. “Just not fast enough. How about we deal with all those bandages, before the hot water runs out?”

She opened her eyes before he could say anything, and went still. Her expression went from amused to curious, and she tilted her head to one side, assessing. “What are you doing?” she asked, when he touched her hair again.

“Honestly?” he said. “I don’t know. I do know I’d rather not stop.”

“I…think I’d rather you didn’t, either,” Kitty said, clearly as surprised at what she’d said as he was. “I’m seriously awkward about this sort of thing. In case you hadn’t noticed.”

“I’m somewhat out of practice myself,” he admitted. He was quite sure he was going to kiss her, all his mind’s protests be damned. He didn’t think he could stop himself even if he wanted to

Unfortunately, he didn’t get the chance. Someone pounded on the bathroom door – hard, impatient blows that suggested she wasn’t going to just wander off. “Some of us need to pee, you know,” Clarice yelled.

Kitty burst into an uncontrollable fit of giggling. “Oops,” she said. “So much for that idea. Get your own!” she yelled. “I’m bleeding all over this one.”

“Oh,” Clarice said, sounding rather subdued. “You need any help?”

“No, I think I’m good,” Kitty replied, stifling another giggle. “I could use a spare shirt, if anyone’s got one. Mine can’t really be qualified as a shirt anymore.”

“Gotcha,” Clarice said. “Don’t bleed to death.”

Kitty shook her head, reaching out to pick at one of the knots on his makeshift bandage. “We probably better finish this up,” she said. “Before somebody just barges on in and wonders what the fuck we’re doing.”

It was a good question. Erik himself wasn’t entirely sure just what the hell he thought he was doing. It was probably a good thing they’d been interrupted – and not just because they were actually injured quite badly. They were probably both still in shock, and shock could make people do all sorts of things they’d regret later. If this did actually go…anywhere…he’d rather it not be because neither of them could really think straight.

“You’re probably right,” he agreed. “And we ought to hurry, before Clarice gets back and asks all sorts of questions I don’t particularly care to answer right now.”

“And she totally would,” Kitty sighed. “Okay. Hopefully your cuts aren’t as nasty as mine.”

\--

It took Clarice a while to find anyone willing to part with their shirt. Under normal circumstances, she knew Logan would have given her his, but he had Rogue practically glued to his side, and was too smart to risk dying if her chin hit his shoulder. Ororo wound up sacrificing her undershirt, which at least wasn’t covered in soot and blood. 

Actually using someone else’s bathroom was harder than it ought to be, too. Everybody was taking turns showering in theirs, and she hoped like hell Kitty hadn’t used all the hot water in theirs. Theoretically, she and Ororo were sharing a room with her (and probably Erik, since the two seemed joined at the damn spleen) and there was only so much water a water heater actually held.

“You’re going to leave the kittens overnight, I hope,” Ororo said. “Even all eight of them together couldn’t flip over that water tray, and you’re in no condition to be portaling anywhere.”

“I know,” she sighed. “I just want to sleep, but I’m not doing that until I get a fucking shower. Kitty’s busy bleeding in ours. Somebody is going to have to deal with her back.” 

“Somebody probably already is,” Ororo said dryly. “Notice who’s missing.”

Clarice made a face. “Oh, God,” she groaned. “You don’t think they’re…you know, do you?”

Ororo took one look at her horrified expression and burst out laughing. “In their condition? I doubt it. I don’t think we need to worry about our shower getting defiled.”

Clarice shuddered. “Thanks for that,” she muttered. 

She needn’t have worried. By the time she got back to the room, she discovered them both swathed in bandages like slightly damp mummies, sound asleep. She set the shirt on the end-table and tiptoed into the bathroom to take her own shower.

It looked like someone had been murdered in there. Half the towels were both wet and bloodstained, and the sink, counter, and walls of the shower were streaked with rusty-red. The sight made her shudder again, but it was hardly going to stop her. She had her own wounds to clean and bandage, and then she would happily sleep until tomorrow afternoon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To all my Kitty/Erik shippers, have a present (slightly awkward, but with those two, right now, it totally would be). To all my Rogue/Logan shippers, you will have a gift once they get back to the mansion, and Logan has all his…supplies. Kitty’s ‘line from a movie’ comes from _Paul._


	37. Homecoming

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which they finally, finally get to go home, and attempt to fully accept the fact that their hell (this one, at least) is truly over with.

Marie slept like the dead – and if she dreamed, she didn’t remember it. She woke sore, but rested, and very relieved.

She’d curled up in the night, head against Logan’s chest, the crown of her hair just brushing the neckline of his shirt. It was a little odd, really, just how well she could stay near him yet avoid killing him, even in her sleep. Apparently, that instinct had formed itself, without any conscious help from her.

While she’d managed a shower last night, her clothes were still filthy and stinking of smoke, and she wrinkled her nose. She didn’t have many spare clothes back at the mansion, so once they were all recovered, they were going shopping, goddammit. If they were to build actual lives now, they’d need more anyway.

Logan was still dead to the world, so she crawled out of bed and tiptoed to the small refrigerator, pulling out bread, peanut butter, and jelly. Anathea and Lia had taken the room’s other bed, and poor Lia wasn’t going to be capable of making her own sandwich, so Marie would put one together for her.

They’d inspected her wounds last night while cleaning and bandaging them, and found that they’d healed exponentially faster than they ought to have. Sharley might not have been able to fix them entirely, but one of them had already scarred over, and the other two were firmly scabbed. Fortunately, none of them had hit either of Lia’s eyes; her vision was obscured only by her bandages, and would be just fine once they were removed. Marie wondered how the others were doing – especially Clarice and Kitty, who had both actually died. She supposed she’d find out soon enough.

The hotel room, thank God, came with a coffee-pot and a small jar of French roast (appropriate), and she set it to percolating before her eyes scanned the room. It seemed odd, that it should look so very normal. After all she’d seen, all she’d endured, she wouldn’t have thought it possible for her to think anything was normal ever again.

She still had a hard time processing the fact that everything was _done_. The nightmare was over, and she doubted she was the only one who was uncertain as to what the hell they were meant to do now. She doubted any of them would go their separate ways – they’d been bound together by the horrors they’d seen, and that was not something that could be broken lightly.

Anathea woke next, and crept as silently as Marie had done. She didn’t look as though she’d slept well, the poor girl; her face was ashy-grey, and there were deep purple smudges under her eyes.

“What do we do now?” she asked, sounding very lost as she made herself a sandwich.

“We go home,” Marie said firmly. “We go home and we rest, and figure everything else out later. It’s not like we don’t have all the time in the world, now.”

“Home.” Marie could see Anathea turning the word over in her head, and wondered if the girl had every really called anywhere home. She had, after all, come from a future just as nightmarish as the one Marie herself had left behind. “I think I must decide what that is.”

Marie gave her a smile. “You’ve got a chance, now. This world has so many amazing things you haven’t seen yet.” She could understand why Clarice had so much fun showing stuff to Anathea and her group: it wasn’t every day you saw that kind of wonder in another person. “Just wait until Halloween.”

“What is Halloween?” 

“Best holiday there is.” Christmas had never really ceased being a bittersweet holiday for Marie; no matter how many good Christmases she’d had at the school, she never had been able to get over missing the way her family had done things. Halloween, on the other hand, had always been fun – not least because it was the only day out of the year that some of the other kids could let loose with their mutations without fear of reprisal. Jubilee had always dressed up as some sort of firecracker, and pretended her mutation was just some wonderfully elaborate special effect. “We’ll have to show you what candy is, before you can really understand how awesome it is. Candy’s sweet, like ice cream and Popsicles, but it’s not cold.”

Anathea took a thoughtful bite of her sandwich. “I never think this world is real,” she said. “The books I read, they were wrote before the first Sentinel war, but I always think the world they talk about was imagination. I never imagined this.”

“Well, you’re stuck with us now,” Logan grunted, rolling over and rubbing his eyes. “Don’t let us overwhelm you with new shit. There’s a hell of a lot more out there.”

“We’ll keep it from drivin’ you nuts,” Marie promised. “Gotta say, a lot of this is a little weird to me, too. And I don’t just mean the ugly-ass clothes.”

Logan snorted. “You just wait until the 80’s roll around,” he said. “You were probably too young to remember much, but _I_ do, and I wish I didn’t. One of those things I actually wouldn’t mind forgettin’.”

Marie laughed. “I’ve seen pictures,” she said. “What were y’all thinkin’?”

“I don’t think we were,” he said, with a grimness that was downright hilarious. “Everybody was too hopped up on cocaine. Only explanation for all that goddamn neon.” 

Anathea obviously had no idea what the hell they were talking about, but she didn’t seem to mind. She appeared to be content to eat her sandwich, savoring it one bite at a time in a way much like Marie still did with all her food. Even now, actual, decent food remained a novelty, after so many years of the garbage she was fed in the camps. 

“I oughtta go see if anyone else is up,” Logan said, stretching. What sounded like every vertebrae in his spine popped like a hail of gunfire. “I feel like I got hit by a fuckin’ truck.”

Marie was quite sure he wasn’t the only one. She brushed a feather-light kiss over his cheek, and went to brush her teeth.

\--

It was pain that woke Clarice – deep, throbbing, stabbing pain that filled her entire abdomen. She needed some aspirin, and she needed it yesterday, but even the thought of getting up was more than she could endure. Even trying to sit up was too much; she choked on a hiss of agony halfway through, and laid back down in defeat.

“Aspirin?” The voice was Kitty’s, and it made Clarice twitch – which, of course, hurt even more. 

“Yeah,” she whispered, barely able to say even that.

“Stay put. I’ll get you a sandwich first, so you don’t yarf any pills back up.” Kitty winced when she sat up, letting out a mantra of “ _motherfucker_ ” under her breath as she grabbed the shirt Clarice had left for her. She was so wrapped up in gauze that she didn’t exactly need it, but it was probably the principle of the thing. The bandages on her back, Clarice noticed, were stained with dried blood, but not badly so.

Kitty’s gait was uneven as she went to the mini-fridge, and her litany of curses continued, but she managed to put together a decent sandwich. “Eat that,” she ordered. “I’ll get you some water.”

Quite honestly, Clarice wasn’t certain how well she _could_ eat, but she somehow forced the sandwich down. Kitty brought her four aspirin with the water, and Clarice gulped them down in rapid succession.

“You’re going to be okay, you know,” Kitty said, tossing back a few aspirin herself. “I mean, yeah, it sucks right now, but you’ll get better. Just don’t let any of the kittens stomp on your stomach for a while.”

Clarice laughed, and immediately wished she hadn’t. “Do you remember anything?” she asked. “About being dead, I mean?”

Kitty sat beside her on the bed, and shook her head. “No. I didn’t even know I’d died. Everything went dark, and then I was awake again. I’m not even sure how long I was dead.”

“Me either,” Clarice said, troubled. “Not that I can even say that’s really weird, compared to everything else that’s happened.” She still wasn’t entirely convinced that the last week hadn’t just been some exceptionally bizarre dream. “You want me to look at your back?”

Kitty gave her a somewhat dubious look. “Do you think you could handle it? I mean, apparently it’s pretty gross. ‘Sliced bacon’ is the comparison I heard last night.”

Clarice winced, the mere thought nauseating her a little. “I can try,” she said. “It bled some, last night. You might want stitches.”

Kitty snorted. “Not quite sure how I’d explain _that_ to an ER doctor. Unless I said somebody tried to murder me, and I just didn’t feel like going to the hospital right away.”

“Good point. Come on, though, let’s try to deal with this before everybody else wakes up and this room turns into a zoo.”

Kitty hobbled her way to the bathroom, pulling off her borrowed shirt. Clarice followed, carrying a roll of fresh gauze. While she’d tried to clean up the bathroom a little, there were still more bloodstains than she was comfortable with. Then again, she wasn’t sure she’d be comfortable with any bloodstains. She directed Kitty to sit on the edge of the tub, and hoped she hadn’t signed on for something she couldn’t actually handle. Though she’d spent years in a horrible, deadly future, she hadn’t actually seen much blood; oh, their group had been attacked and murdered by Sentinels several times, but Kitty had always managed to send Bishop back and avert it. Which mean poor Bishop was the only one who remembered just how many times his group had been slaughtered.

“You let me know if this gets too much, okay?” Kitty said, pulling her hair out of the way.

“I will,” Clarice said, knowing that she probably wouldn’t, at least not until it was too late.

The gauze didn’t want to come off – it had stuck to the wounds in several places, and she was hesitant to pry at it for fear of re-opening any of them. It took some creative applications of a damp washcloth to un-stick it all, and by then she was ready to gag.

‘Sliced bacon’ was an understatement. There were five wounds in all, but they were much further apart than the size of a human hand should be capable of it. The worst of them was a good two inches across, and had cut down right through the skin and deep into the muscle of Kitty’s shoulder. The edges were ragged, suggesting her skin had been torn as well as cut, and although here and there were patches of pinkish scar tissue, most of it was scabbed. Some of the scabs were harder, and looked older, but others were nauseatingly fresh.

“Clarice?” Kitty said, trying to look over her shoulder. “Clarice, sit down before you keel over.”

“I’m fine,” Clarice said, swallowing her rising gorge with difficulty. “Just hold still.”

“That’s what she said,” Kitty said solemnly. It was exactly the kind of tension-breaker Clarice needed, and for a moment she was giggling too hard to do anything else. When she finally stopped, she felt confident enough to get on with her work.

She probably wasn’t as thorough about washing all the cuts as she should have been, but she doubted Kitty minded, since it had to hurt like a bitch as it was. The antiseptic salve would take care of anything she missed, and then she could get some fresh air and attempt to avoid throwing up her breakfast.

“You’re doing that wrong.”

She and Kitty both jumped, with the result that they swore and winced in unison. Clarice turned to find Erik, tired, irritated, and not a little blood-stained himself, glowering at her. “Go sit down and make certain your internal organs don’t fall out of alignment,” he ordered. “If the others aren’t awake yet, they should be, so Ororo ought to go check – not you,” he added, before she could so much as open her mouth. “If you die of internal bleeding, I’m sure someone will find a way to blame me. Go. Sit.”

If she’d been in less pain – and been much less nauseated – she probably would have thrown some crack right back at him, but as it was, her stomach was threatening mutiny. As it was, she was happy to limp her way back to her own bed.

“Don’t abandon me, Clarice!” Kitty said plaintively. “He’ll pick all the scabs off and eat them.”

It was a toss-up between laughing and puking at the mental image, but fortunately, laughter won out. It still hurt, but it was better than vomiting.

“You,” Erik intoned, “are absolutely disgusting. Now hold still.”

“Yes, _Mother_.”

Clarice rolled her eyes. This was going to be a very, very long day.

\--

When Logan stepped outside, he discovered that the afternoon was well on its way to being completely sweltering. They couldn’t get to that plane (and its air conditioning) fast enough, in his opinion.

He found the Professor – _his_ Professor – sitting out on the veranda, looking unfairly serene. You’d never know he’d spent most of the last night dealing with a group of creatures straight out of a deranged, acid-dropping lunatic’s nightmares. It was damn reassuring, in a way Logan doubted anything else could have been.

“Ready to go home, Logan?” he asked.

“You have no idea,” Logan said, and carefully didn’t think of the fact that there was more than one reason for that. Professor had probably been traumatized enough, without _that_ thought. “Right now, I’d just settle for gettin’ outta this heat. Forgot how rare air conditionin’ was in 1973.”

The Professor laughed. “It’s not the only thing I’d forgotten. Still, I would take a lifetime of this humidity over one day in the future.”

Logan shuddered. “Don’t remind me,” he said. “I’m still not sure I wanna know what’s happenin’ to my body, fifty years from now. Especially if it’s got nobody guardin’ it anymore.” If Charles and Magneto were back here, too, it only stood to reason that the others were roaming around somewhere. Maybe his future body was comatose in a ditch somewhere. He hoped Trask never got his hands on it – provided Trask was in any fit mental state to get his hands on anything.

“I would hope that fifty years from _now_ is not what it was when we left it,” the Professor said. “You’ve all certainly done an exceptional job of changing history in the last week. I hope you and Marie will stay at the mansion, when we return.”

“That’s the plan.” Logan pulled his one remaining cigar out of his pocket – he’d brought it on the odd chance they’d actually survive long enough for him to smoke it. “Pretty sure younger you is gonna want to open up the school again. Marie’d make a good teacher, and I could find somethin’ to do.”

The Professor laughed. “You could teach, too, if you forced yourself to have a little patience,” he said. “Mechanics, maybe. You’re certainly far more knowledgeable now than anyone in 1973.”

Logan snorted. “True. It’s worth a thought, anyway. I don’t know that I can plan much of anythin’ yet, though. Not so soon after…all that shit.”

“I don’t blame you. I think we’ll all need a little time, once we’re home. Last night is not the sort of thing one gets over in a hurry.”

Wasn’t that an understatement. “So what do we do about Alfred?” he asked. “I mean, even if Kitty manages to put his heart back, we can’t just let him run around, but we can’t exactly send him to prison, either. Might make the law look at us a little funny, if we just dropped off some guy with no records and said ‘here, have fun’.”

“That,” the Professor said, “is something best dealt with once we’re back at the mansion. We have an entire trans-Atlantic flight to think about it.”

Hank, who had come shuffling out of his own room, groaned. “Don’t remind me,” he said. “I’m not looking forward to that.” He was no longer his blue-furred self, and his complexion was downright pasty.

“You sure you can handle it?” Logan said, eyeing him doubtfully. “It’s a long-ass flight.”

“I’ll be fine,” Hank said. “But I’d like to be off soon.”

“You and me both,” Logan muttered.

\--

Though they all wanted to get home, nobody was particularly happy on the ride to the airport. Half of them fell asleep again, and the other half grumbled. The bottle of bourbon made the rounds more than once.

Once they’d reached the plane, Clarice portaled inside to corral the kittens before Hank opened the cabin door.

Marie climbed in first, mostly so she could be settled before everyone else got on – while it was unlikely she’d manage to kill someone by tripping over them, she didn’t want to risk it. She fetched up by the mini-fridge, a bottle of sparkling water in her hand, waiting until everyone was on board and the kittens could be released again.

Logan joined her, stealing her water, apparently content to let the others handle stowing all their shit. Given that he’d loaded most of it, he couldn’t really be blamed. “Hittin’ the fabric store tomorrow,” he said, apropos of absolutely nothing. “Want you to come with me and test a few things.”

Marie blinked, wondering what in the name of mother fuck that had to do with…well, anything. “Need a little more information, sugar,” she said. 

He gave her a smirk that was pure sin. “Fabric,” he said. “Kinda need some for…some things, and it’s better if you pick out what feels best.”

Comprehension dawned, and her face heated. “…Gotcha,” she said. “I think I can arrange that. You know, take some time outta my busy schedule.”

He laughed, and carefully tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “You do that. Gonna get the Professor’s credit card, if I can. Buy the best shit they’ve got.”

“As long as it’s not _actual_ shit,” she warned. “There’s kinky, and then there’s disgustin’.”

“What’s disgusting?” Clarice asked. She was tiptoeing through the maze of legs and feet, a kitten in each hand. She almost tripped over poor Anathea, who spilled water all over her legs. “Sorry.”

“Something that apparently fails to be kinky,” Erik said, wincing as a kitten climbed his bandages. “Best not to ask, I think.”

Clarice wrinkled her nose. “You’re probably right. Have a kitten.” She shoved one at Marie, as though using it to ward off any unwanted disgusting kinkiness. The kitten, not liking being used as a tiny furry shield, squeaked and bit her thumb.

Marie laughed. “C’mere, you little fuzzy thing,” she said, taking the kitten and ignoring Logan’s long-suffering sigh. “I missed you little critters.”

“Oh, not you, too,” Erik sighed. “They are not _critters_.”

“Says you,” Kitty said, letting the white one crawl up her arm and sit on her shoulder, like a little fluffy parrot. “Somebody wanna make sure the stripy one doesn’t go too close to Alfred? I’m not sure he won’t eat it.”

Marie looked at the man in question, who had been stuffed just behind the cockpit on the right side of the plane. He didn’t look capable of eating much of anything: she didn’t know if he was drugged, or if one of the Professors had shut his mind down for a while. Either way, he looked as threatening as a slug.

Anathea must have disagreed, because she snatched up the kitten and handed it to Lia. The girl herself appeared slightly dazed, which made Marie wonder if someone had given her something stronger than aspirin. She certainly didn’t seem to be in any pain, which was what really mattered. 

Beside her, Janek looked so forlorn that Marie wasn’t sure if she should laugh, or smack Erik for being such a smug bastard. If Kitty figured out what he was doing, she’d smack him herself – but she seemed much too occupied with her kitten, which was currently chewing on her hair. 

_Children_ , Marie thought. _I’m flyin’ with a bunch of children._ She looked at Logan, hoping he’d be able to read her expression – which was something of a mistake, because she found him locked in a staring contest with the ginger kitten.

“We’re all mad here,” she muttered, quoting Lewis Carroll.

“Well, _duh_ ,” Kitty said. 

\--

There was still a little light left when they landed, so loading the second bus was no difficulty. Ororo just wanted a shower and some clean clothes, and she’d happily toddle off to bed once more. She hadn’t managed a nap on the flight, though almost everyone else had. 

Crowded though it was, they’d given Clarice one of the bench seats, so she could properly lie down. She’d got paler and paler as the flight went on, despite having a sandwich and more aspirin foisted on her, and Ororo worried about just how badly mangled her insides might really be.

Kitty fussed over her for a while, too, but she had to be in a great deal of pain herself. Eventually Ororo shooed her off, and she went to snooze on Erik like she was an oversized kitten herself. It had to have hurt, but surprisingly, he didn’t complain. For some reason, Ororo found that worrisome rather than sweet.

Because Clarice was so laid up, Rogue was the one who crated most of the kittens, none of whom were happy about it. The chorus of meows and squeaks at least kept everyone awake, more or less, on the bus ride home.

Home. They were going home. No more Memories, no more nightmares (at least, not of the supernatural variety); Ororo could scarcely believe it. They could relax, and do whatever they wanted now, without a proverbial Sword of Damocles looming over everything they did and thought.

When they finally reached the mansion, Marie and Logan were the ones who manhandled the kitten-crate inside. Though they let the little things loose in the usual room, they didn’t stay there themselves – no doubt they wanted privacy, and that was as far as Ororo was willing to go with that thought.

Clarice, by now, hurt so much that she couldn’t even walk: Hank carried her to the kitten room, and went to fetch her something stronger than the aspirin she’d been swallowing the whole flight. Ororo worried that they were going to have to take her to a hospital, and figure out some explanation for her half-healed wounds.

“I’d better stay with her,” Hank said, “just in case. You go get some sleep.”

“I might as well stay, myself,” she said. “I’m a far more familiar face. Is she running a fever?”

“If she is, it’s very low-grade,” he said. “I’ll take her temperature before she goes to sleep, but I think she’s just suffering from the pain of her injuries. I mean, she was _dead_ for a while.” No doubt he wanted to run tests to see just how that was possible, but he’d have to run them later.

Erik came in, scanned the room, and grabbed the white kitten. “You need to look at Kitty’s back,” he said to Hank. “I did what I could last night, but I’m no doctor. And she needs a real painkiller.”

Ororo looked at his chest. Some of the gauze was stained with dried blood – obviously his own wounds had opened again while they were flying. “And you don’t?” she asked, giving him a thoroughly unimpressed look.

“I can take care of myself,” he said shortly. “ _I_ am not the one who died last night.”

Ororo snorted. “Word of advice? Don’t ever, ever, ever imply that Kitty can’t look after herself. Especially not within her earshot. And definitely don’t keep reminding her that she was actually dead for a while. She won’t bring that up until she’s good and ready.”

“Believe it or not, I’m not a _complete_ fool,” he retorted, with more than a little asperity. “I just want to make sure she isn’t going to die again. You can hardly fault me for that.”

“No, I can’t,” she said. “Just…be careful, okay? Normally Kitty’s almost impossible to really piss off, but nothing about this has been normal. I don’t think she’d hurt you on purpose, but if her nightmares are bad enough, she’s perfectly capable of killing you.”

“I’m aware of that,” he said. “I know what happened with the girl, Tara.”

Ororo’s eyebrows shot up. “She _told_ you that?”

“She was rather drunk at the time, but yes. As I said, I’m not a complete fool. Hank, when you get a moment, come with me. If she falls asleep and we have to wake her up to check her injuries, she won’t be happy.” Which meant, of course, that she’d spread it around with a big shovel.

Ororo shook her head. While it was good to be home, she was fairly sure that didn’t mean their problems were over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Of course their problems aren’t quite over, Ororo. It’s just that what you all face now won’t be so potentially lethal – just annoying. Next chapter will contain the long-awaited Logan and Rogue Happy Fun Times, among many other things.


	38. Touch and Memories (no, not THOSE Memories)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which it is discovered there’s more to being dead than anyone suspected, and Marie and Logan finally get some alone time. Contains sexual content between two consenting adults who are trying to figure out how the hell to be intimate when they can’t actually touch each other.

Marie’s dreams were so odd that she didn’t think they were actually hers. They had to be Sharley’s, because they had the clarity of memory, but they certainly weren’t _her_ memories.

She woke long before Logan, and went to grab a pen and some paper so she could write them down. She wasn’t sure why she thought it was so important that she did so, but instinct drove her, and she hadn’t survived this long by ignoring her instincts.

She’d been underground in the dream, though quite how she’d known that, she wasn’t sure. Her surroundings had looked like an office building left vacant for a very long time: industrial-grey carpeting that was badly water-stained in places, with patches of black mold in the corners. The desks, tucked into ruinous cubicles, were covered with dust, as were the papers scattered over everything. 

It wasn’t just that everyone had left in a hurry – something violent had happened here. The wall to the left of her was buckled inward, and a good quarter of the ceiling tiles had fallen. A single, badly-flickering fluorescent light illuminated the room, leaving unsettling shadows dancing over everything. Despite the mold, the air was far too dry, and it had the telltale electrified-penny scent of the Other.

Spooky though the surroundings were, she wasn’t afraid – but then, if this really was Sharley’s memory, she wouldn’t be. Sharley, whatever she was, didn’t have to fear being hurt or killed by anything. She was looking for something – just what, Marie didn’t know, but it was something she needed. Unfortunately, she’d woken up before she found it.

“What’re you doin’, darlin’?” Logan’s voice was heavy and hoarse with sleep.

“Writin’ down my dreams,” she said, setting down her pen and turning to him. “Had some weird ones last night.”

He sat up, suddenly worried. “Nightmares?”

“No, just weird. Pretty sure they’re Sharley’s.”

“She still rattlin’ around in your head?” he asked, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. 

“If she is, she’s bein’ quiet about it. Unlike a few other people I could name,” she added, giving him a pointed look. “You’re an awfully active echo, sugar. And you’ve been tellin’ me all sorts of things you’d like to do to me. I knew you had a dirty mind, but for fuck’s sake, but I’m pretty sure some of that isn’t even _possible_.”

To her surprise, Logan actually looked _embarrassed_. She never thought she’d see the day that happened. “About that,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Marie, just how much experience have you got, with things like that?” Was it just her, or did he actually sound a little concerned?

“Not much,” she admitted. “Kinda hard to, you know? Bobby and I tried some stuff, but I think I was more afraid of hurtin’ him than he was, which was a pretty damn big mood-killer.”

“Thought as much. Marie, before we even head out, I want you to promise me somethin’, okay? If I start goin’ too far, too fast, you need to tell me. I’m gonna be careful, but if I start crossin’ any lines, I need to know about it. Don’t go thinkin’ I’ll get peeved if you have to stop. We’ve got a lotta time – don’t need to rush to the finish line first time outta the gate, if you get my meanin’. ”

He sounded almost hesitant, and it was that, even more than his words, that warmed her. She trusted him completely, but since _she_ wasn’t sure what lines she might have, he sure as hell wouldn’t if she didn’t say so. While she didn’t anticipate any difficulty, she had no way of actually knowing until they got right down to it.

“I will, sugar,” she said, reaching out and resting her hand on his knee. She didn’t have her gloves on, or she would have taken his hand in hers. “I know I can trust you, and I’ll tell you if I’ve gotta take a break.”

He gave her a grin. “Good. Let’s get some showers and some breakfast, and see if we can sneak off before anybody else decides they want to come on our field trip.”

\--

Kitty too had risen early, and followed the scent of cinnamon rolls into the kitchen. Clarice was hard at work, and looked as disturbed as Kitty felt.

“You had weird dreams last night, didn’t you?” Kitty asked, pouring herself some coffee and hopping up to sit on the counter. She immediately winced, thanks to the pain that jagged through her ribs and her back. Once she’d had a few cinnamon rolls, she was off to steal some of the industrial-strength painkillers from Hank. The slightly vacant expression on Clarice’s face suggested she’d already nabbed some.

“Yeah,” she said, setting down her spatula. “It had to be the Other, since the sky was all red. I was on a ship, a big one with sails and everything, but it was in the air.”

Kitty couldn’t say she was surprised by how similar it had been to her own dream, but it was still a little unsettling. “Same here. It wasn’t scary, though, was it? Just…odd.” 

“What was odd?”

Both of them jumped, and Kitty sloshed coffee all over the floor. “Jesus, Erik, wear a bell. Clarice and I had the same dream last night. I think we might be remembering what happened when we were dead.”

He gave her a strange look as he grabbed a mug from the cupboard. “Why would you say that? Did someone tell you so?”

“No. It’s just – you know how sometimes you can dream something, and just know what’s going on without anyone explaining it? It’s just…dream-logic. I don’t know where I was, but – and I know this sounds really stupid – I sort of felt like I was…home.” It was frustrating not to be able to actually put words around it. What she’d seen, what she’d felt – it had all been so strong, so right, but there was no explaining it.

“You too, huh?” Clarice asked, pulling a cookie-sheet out of the oven. “There was just something warm about it. Like, even though it was the Other, it was a protected place. I didn’t even see any other people, but I knew nothing could hurt me there.”

That was it in a nutshell, but at the same time, it didn’t do the feeling justice. Kitty doubted anything could, short of actual experiencing it. “Yeah,” she said. “Maybe that’s why we couldn’t consciously remember it, when we first came back. I didn’t want to leave.”

Erik was across the kitchen so fast she’d swear he’d teleported. It startled her so much that she dropped her coffee cup, which shattered when it hit the tiles and sprayed hot coffee everywhere. He grabbed her shoulders, though at least he stopped short of actually shaking her.

“Don’t you say that,” he said. “Don’t you _ever_ say that again.” He looked ready to duct-tape her to the counter, if he thought it would actually make her stay put.

She stared at him, wide-eyed. “Um, okay,” she said, wondering just where in the hell _that_ had come from. It took a moment for comprehension to hit her like a brick. “You were actually scared, weren’t you?” she asked. “I mean, like a normal person.”

He shut his eyes, and she could practically hear him counting to ten in his head. “Yes, I was scared,” he said, releasing her shoulders. He sounded like he really, really grudged the admission. “You were _dead_ , and there was nothing I could do about it.”

Further understanding clicked. How many people had he lost already? And how many of them had he watched die? “Hey,” she said, nudging him with one coffee-stained foot. “I’m not going anywhere. You’re not going to get rid of me that easily.” She looked down at the floor. “I’m also not cleaning that up.”

Most of the tension left him, and he actually laughed. There wasn’t a lot of humor in it, but there was a little. “Fair enough,” he said. “Stay there. I don’t actually know where the broom is.”

“Closet in the hallway,” Clarice said automatically. When he’d left, she stared at Kitty, who shrugged.

“Don’t ask me,” she said. “Gimme one of those cinnamon rolls, will you?”

\--

Ororo had planned to go shopping today, and was somewhat disgruntled to find that someone had got to the car first. She didn’t want to drive the bus all by herself, but she was having a difficult time talking anyone else into going with her. Most of them were simply too tired, physically and mentally.

Anathea and her crew had gone to swim in the pond, lugging some sandwiches and bottles of water with them. Alfred was once again shut in the bunker: they’d try to put his heart back eventually, but not until Kitty felt confident enough to do it. What they were to do with him then, nobody knew, but that was a problem best shelved for now. It wasn’t like they didn’t have time.

Both Professors had sequestered themselves, no doubt needing a while to process everything that had passed through their minds. The elder Magneto was nowhere to be found; it was possible he needed the same thing, if for different reasons. Raven was napping in a hammock beneath one huge oak tree, Clarice was concocting something frozen – and no doubt delicious – in the kitchen, with Hank, God help their digestive tracts, attempting to help. Kitty had gone to play with the kittens, which meant Erik was probably with her, considering he didn’t seem to want to let her out of his sight for more than five minutes at a time. That left Ororo on her own, and surprisingly restless.

She wandered into the garage, poking around for lack of anything better to do. It was obvious that it was rarely used: almost everything was coated with dust, and several years’ worth of cobwebs stretched across the ceiling. Tarps and paint cans lined one wall, along with rows upon row of tools. It was a far cry from the place as she’d known it in the future.

At the very back, there was a large lump of something beneath a blue tarp, and she pulled it aside, curious.

What she saw made her grin. It was old – it looked like it had been built in the 1950’s at the very latest – but it was a motorcycle, and she intended to see if it still ran. If it did, she was headed out on a little trip. _Where_ she was going to go, she wasn’t sure, but it didn’t really matter. The ride was what counted.

\--

Logan, unsurprisingly, felt extremely out-of-place in the fabric store.

He must have looked as odd as he felt, because the dozens of little old ladies he saw all eyed him like he was the Big Bad Wolf. It was only Marie’s presence that kept him from growling at them. Every time he started scowling, she elbowed him in the ribs, and gave him an arched eyebrow. It was her silent way of saying, _Don’t get us kicked out._

He didn’t bother asking where anything was. He and Marie browsed, testing fabrics, laughing at some of the completely hideous 70’s patterns (though he still maintained the 80’s were the worst), until they reached the really fancy stuff. 

Logan grabbed a bolt off the top shelf. It was silk, the same shade of green as the coat she’d worn when he first met her. While he hadn’t started thinking about her _that_ way for another couple years, he’d been partial to that shade ever since then. It was Marie.

Apparently she read his train of thought, because she gave him another arch of an eyebrow. “That color, huh?” she asked, running her fingers over the fabric. “Feels nice, that’s for damn sure.”

“Darlin’, you have no idea. Let’s get about eight yards of this, and maybe some black velvet.”

Marie laughed. “Black velvet in that little boy’s smile,” she sang. “Black velvet in that slow southern style…”

He snorted. “Dunno about southern, but ‘slow style’ sounds about right.”

She grinned at him, but he could smell the spike in her arousal. Good. Better to ease her into this, rather than thwack her upside the head with it.

They took their bolts to the cutting-counter, ignoring the employee’s surprised stare. Once they’d paid and headed out the door, Marie couldn’t suppress a giggle. “I think she had some guesses about what we’d be doin’ with all this,” she said. “I mean – oh, shit, is that Ororo?”

It was. Even at a distance, that hair was unmistakable, and Logan felt Marie duck behind him. She’d probably feel awkward, if Ororo asked any questions. Logan wouldn’t, but then, it was hard for him to feel awkward over much of anything.

“She hasn’t seen us,” he said. “Let’s go.”

They hurried to the car, Marie laughing again, and were out on the road before Ororo could hope to stop them. Logan didn’t mention that he was going to make damn sure nobody would be stupid enough to disturb them unless the house was burning down – Marie would be mortified if she knew, though he couldn’t say he understood why. It might be a woman thing, or it might just be a Marie thing: she never had like people sticking their nose in her business. Well, unless it was him – she’d rarely kept anything from him.

He rested his free hand on her knee – it wasn’t a gesture of seduction, but of comfort. She might think she was completely on board with everything, but if she had as little experience as he suspected, too much too fast might be overwhelming. Most teenagers had the advantage of necking quite a bit before getting to the main event – he was pretty sure of that, anyway. He didn’t remember his own adolescence, but he _did_ remember constantly kicking out students who’d been making out in odd places.

Marie had no such advantage – or at least, not much. It didn’t sound like what she and Ice Man had done had made it very far. The last thing in the world Logan wanted to do was freak her out, and he was going to make damn sure he didn’t.

\--

Most of the herd had already moved through for breakfast, so Clarice was walking Hank through the intricacies of properly washing dishes. She couldn’t believe that he, as a scientist, was so abysmal at it: surely he’d had to sterilize beakers and tools, right?

“Not really that kind of scientist,” he pointed out. “And when I was at school, we had assistants for that. Plus an autoclave, to fully sterilize the equipment.”

Clarice rolled her eyes. “Whatever. If you really want to learn to cook, you have to learn how to do this right. I _am_ glad you’re helping, though,” she added, though that wasn’t entirely truthful. She appreciated his willingness and desire to learn, but at this point, he still made more work than he accomplished. He’d get there, though. 

“Where the hell are Rogue and Logan?” she asked. She would have expected Logan especially to come down and inhale half the things she’d made.

Kitty snorted. “It’s our first actual day home, everybody’s glad to be alive, and it’s those two,” she said. “You do the math.”

To Clarice’s amusement, Hank went absolutely scarlet. “Right,” he said. “Maybe we should make sure nobody, uh, bothers them.”

“Yeeeah, that’s probably best for all concerned,” Kitty said. “Never know what either of them might to do anyone who interrupted. Somebody would probably wind up going to the hospital.”

“I’ll put some plates in the fridge, just in case,” Clarice said. “Then I think I might vacate the house for a bit.”

“Can’t blame you,” Kitty agreed. “We need spare clothes. Mall ought to be far enough away.”

“Are you all five years old?” Erik asked, disbelief heavy in his voice. “Last I checked, we were all adults. Chronologically, anyway,” he added, giving the three of them a dubious look.

“You don’t have the historical context to understand,” Kitty said. “We’ve all been rooting for them for, I shit you not, well over a decade. That doesn’t mean we actually want to…hear anything, because dude. Just no. Besides, we really do need more clothes.”

He rolled his eyes. “Won’t this excursion be a thing of joy. Clarice, you are not allowed anywhere _near_ the steering wheel.”

She wanted to protest, but given her driving record in 1973, she didn’t have much of a leg to stand on. “What are we going to do for money?” she asked.

“Leave that to me,” Erik said. Somehow, that did not fill her with confidence.

\--

Logan and Marie’s room was at the north side of the house, but even though they’d left the windows open, it was still almost too warm for comfort. Stripping off her gloves and shirt was an act of practicality, not seduction, but she really doubted Logan was going to mind not getting a straight-up strip tease. He was Logan. She doubted that sort of shit would matter much to him, anyway.

The grin he gave her was absolutely evil, and did some very strange things to her insides. Nobody had ever looked at her like that before – the heat in his eyes was far more scorching even than the July sun.

“I hope that means you like what you’re seein’, sugar,” she said, arching an eyebrow at him.

“Darlin’, you have _no idea_ ,” he returned. “Come on over here.” He dumped the shopping-bag onto the bed, unfolding the length of silk with another downright lascivious grin.

“Only if you get rid of this,” she said, crossing the floor and tugging on the hem of his shirt. “I swear, you used to run around shirtless just to get me all hot and bothered.”

“You’re right,” he said, yanking the shirt over his head in one enviably smooth motion. “I did. Worked, too, didn’t it?”

“Ass,” she said, grabbing the end of the silk so she could swat him on the arm. “You know it did.” Her hand paused, and then she ran it up to his shoulder, fascinated by the feel of his muscles beneath her fingers. Even with the silk, she could feel the warmth of his skin, and she was so close she could smell him – leather and spice and _Logan_ , whose scent she could never mistake for anyone or anything else. She stood on her tiptoes so she could ghost her lips over his throat, almost but not quite touching. With Bobby, she’d been terrified of hurting him; with Logan, there was a strange thrill to it, to dancing as close to the dangerous edge of touch without jumping over it. It helped that she now had a better idea of just how long she had before her mutation actually started to pull at someone – and that Logan was far less likely to get hurt by a brief, errant touch.

She felt him shudder, and it left her with an odd, almost intoxicating sense of _power_. She was the one doing this to him – the one making him shiver under her light, admittedly inexperienced touch. He certainly didn’t seem to care that she really had no idea what in the fuck she was actually doing. Instinct and curiosity drove her.

Marie jumped when she felt his touch against her side. His silk-covered hand traced the curve of her waist and up along her back. His fingers danced along her spine as his other hand settled just above her left hip. It made her back arch, and his throaty chuckled reverberated through her chest. 

He unclasped her brat with a speed and a dexterity that sent her eyebrows up. “Good at that, aren’t you, sugar?”

“Good at a lot more than that,” he returned, slipping the garment down her arms. Never in her life had Marie been this exposed to anyone, and she felt suddenly shy.

“Too much?” he asked, looking down at her with serious eyes.

“No. Just…new,” she assured him, with a crooked smile. “Never got this far before.”

He dropped a kiss on the top of her head. “Go on and lay down,” he said. “Trust me.”

She crept up onto the bed, lying back on the pillows. He didn’t need to ask her to trust him – _that_ was a given. She didn’t know why she was suddenly so nervous.

He crept over her, and paused. “You need to slow down, darlin’?”

“…I think so. I mean, just for a minute.” She was almost embarrassed, but Logan gave her a reassuring smile.

“It’s okay,” he said, running his left hand through her hair. He lay beside her, draping the end of the silk over his chest, and pulled her close. The sound of his heartbeat was reassuring, the silk deliciously soft against her cheek. 

He wrapped the rest of the silk around her back, rubbing soothing circles around her shoulders. She traced his collarbone, running her hand down his chest and along his stomach. “Can I just sorta…explore?” she asked. “Dunno if I’m ready to get touched too much yet, but I’ve been wantin’ to molest you for years now.”

Logan burst out laughing. “Darlin’, you do whatever you like. You just let me know if you want me to do anythin’.”

She sat up again, disentangling herself from her end of the silk, and wrapped it once around her hands. With a grin, she ran both hands up his chest again, very slowly, fascinated by the way it made him arch his back. Every time she’d seen him with his shirt off, she’d wanted to do this – well, this and lick him, but that wasn’t possible. 

Again she traced his collarbones, out along his shoulders and down his arms. The muscles of his arms and chest fascinated her, as did the hitch in his breath when she ran her fingers over the waistband of his jeans.

Now it was her turn for an absolutely evil grin. “You keep holdin’ still, sugar,” she said. “I won’t leave you wantin’, but you’ve gotta be patient.”

Logan groaned, and the sound shot a bolt of heat straight through her. “You tryin’ to kill me, darlin?”

She laughed. “Oh, you’d known if I was doin’ that. You just hang on.”

Unzipping someone else’s fly was surprisingly difficult. She allowed him to move enough to kick off his pants, and was somehow unsurprised to find he went commando. 

Marie might be inexperienced, but she was hardly ignorant. She had, after all, lived in a school full of teenagers, who had sometimes ludicrously complex means of smuggling porn. While most of it seemed unrealistic – and, ironically, rather unsexy – it had at least been a useful anatomy lesson. She grinned to herself, silently vowing to make Logan lose his damn mind.

“You hold still, sugar,” she said, trying to keep the wicked glee out of her voice and completely failing. She wrapped her silk-swathed had around him, her grin widening at his sharp, sudden intake of breath. “I said hold _still_ ,” she said again, sternly, when he tried to reach for her on what she suspected was auto-pilot.

“Bossy, aren’t yo --” the world trailed off in a groan as she stroked him with her fingers – inexpertly, sure, but he hardly seemed to care. 

She propped herself up with her left hand, watching him avidly as she worked him over with fingers and silk. God, he was actually _trembling_ – fighting to hold still as she unabashedly tortured him. What else could she make him do, just by touching him? 

Leaning forward, she let her breath ghost over his chest, breathing him in as her fingers gave him a light squeeze. He groaned again, swallowing audibly, and she thought, _fuck it_. A half-second touch wouldn’t hurt him, so she darted her tongue out and gave him a taste.

His entire body jerked, hands closing into fists around the blankets. God _damn_ did she feel powerful – she’d never seen Logan helpless, willingly or unwillingly, but he’d surrendered to her now, even though it was obviously hard for him. 

_Heh, hard_ , she thought, and had to fight a giggle. She gave him another lick instead, and another, working her way up his chest. 

He was actually writhing under her, his hips jerking involuntarily into her hand – when her lips finally found his, the look he gave her was downright desperate. He wanted to grab her, and she knew it – wanted to roll her under him and do all manner of dirty things to her – but he was restraining himself for her sake. 

She gave him a light, butterfly-brush of a kiss. “Look at me, sugar,” she said, the pace and pressure of her fingers increasing as she stroked him. She couldn’t bring herself to leave him hanging, no matter how curious she was to see how he’d react if she did.

He shut his eyes a moment, and actually growled when he looked at her again. Every single muscle in his body had gone taut, no doubt with the effort of holding still. She stroked him faster, marveling at the tremors that wracked his body, strengthening and quickening until he threw back his head and let out a groan that was beyond obscene. The silk in her hand grew hot and wet, and she grinned proudly. _She’d_ done this to him – she’d made him come so thoroughly undone, had driven him to boneless relaxation. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t gotten off herself, not yet: there was something to be said for giving and watching.

When he finally opened his eyes, she smirked down at him. “Was it good for you?” she asked.

Logan laughed, and she was pleased to hear it was a little shaky. “Darlin’,” he said, “you have no idea. You gonna let me repay the favor?”

She gave this due consideration. “Maybe once you don’t sound like you’re drunk,” she said. “Wanted to make you make sounds like that since I was nineteen.”

“Just you wait ’til you hear the sounds I’m gonna get outta you,” he growled, tossing the free end of the silk over his chest so he could pull her down only him. “You give me a chance, I’ll make sure you never wanna leave this bed.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, they have not yet actually had the sex, but there’s a reason for that. As Logan realizes, Marie is at a pretty severe disadvantage in this: she’s got next to no experience whatsoever. You don’t take someone who’s never tried to swim and chuck them into the deep end -- not without letting them wade in the shallows for a bit. Don’t worry, he’ll return the favor, once she’d ready.


	39. The Continuing Lure of Death

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which death has left more than simply physical scars, Clarice has an existential crisis and Kitty is eaten up with guilt, and nobody wants to interrupt Logan and Rogue (so, consequently, they are entirely out of the loop). Meanwhile, Erik and Kitty continue to be both snarky and slightly awkward.

By the time they returned from their nightmare of a shopping excursion, Erik was in far more pain than he liked – and it was quite obvious the other two were as well. 

He was used to hearing Kitty grouse about just about everything, and the fact that she’d gone silent was…worrisome. In the backseat, Clarice was curled up in a fetal position, and he knew Hank was going to have to look at her first – and very likely chew Erik out for taking the pair out of the house to begin with. As if he somehow could have stopped them.

He left their plethora of shopping bags in the trunk, instead opting to stalk his angry way to the infirmary in search of Hank. While he could easily tend to Kitty’s back, he was totally incapable of dealing with any kind of internal bleeding: he didn’t even know how to diagnose it. Aside from Charles, Hank was the only one who legally existed in this time and place, and was thus the only one who could take Clarice to the hospital if she needed to go. It would be best if she didn’t, since Erik doubted they’d allow her to leave the scarf over her distinctive hair and ears. That was not, however, his problem.

Hank was every bit as annoyed as he’d expected, following in such righteous fury that the veins in his forehead throbbed blue.

“Don’t blame _me_ ,” Erik said caustically. “I could hardly have kept them here. At least by going with them, I could get them home again.”

Home. It was such an odd word to use – and definitely strange as a description for the mansion, the memory of which had been bitter for so long. It was, however, the only term that actually fit.

“True,” Hank said, grudgingly. “I’d dope them both to the eyeballs if they hadn’t both lost so much blood recently. I still can’t tell just how advanced all of your healing actually is – especially Clarice’s. I don’t the diagnostic equipment for it.”

“Well, you’d better do something, or Charles will never forgive us.” Either Charles. Erik still hadn’t wrapped his mind around his and Charles’s elder selves – possibly because he didn’t want to. After everything, his brain just might not be able to handle it yet.

Hank winced. “I’ll try,” he said. “You just make sure Kitty doesn’t run off and do something stupid. Again.”

At this point, Kitty wasn’t capable of _running_ anywhere. Even with the somewhat unfortunate pattern of her shirt, Erik could see several lines of blotchy, uneven patches of rust, which worried him. If she’d managed to bleed through her bandages enough to stain her shirt, she’d ripped open at least one of her wounds. Between that and her borderline-heat stroke, she wasn’t going anywhere on her own two feet. 

She grumbled when he eased her out of the car – but it was only token resistance, what seemed to be an automatic reflex, and that worried him. If her snark was that subdued, she was indeed in a very large amount of pain.

“Stay awake,” he said, the words reminding him far too forcefully of the last time he’d uttered them. The circumstances were hardly the same, he told himself: yes, she was overheated and bleeding, but even without looking at her back he was sure she wasn’t about to bleed to death. She just needed food, a cool place to lay down, and possibly sedation, willing or otherwise. Hank would know what to do, once he was done with Clarice.

“Don’t want to,” Kitty groused, and hissed in pain when he picked her up. He didn’t exactly enjoy it, either, since the aspirin he’d taken before they left had almost entirely worn off. 

“Well, you’d better,” he said, trying not to jolt her as he walked – for his own sake as well as hers. She might not weigh much, but it had only been two days since his chest had been shredded like cheese. “I never did repay you for that crouton in my ear. I’m sure we still have some in the kitchen.”

She laughed, and immediately winced. “Jackass,” she muttered.

“That’s more like it. I’m going to need to look at your back.” When he stepped into the house, he found that it was even hotter than it had been when they left, but it was still better than the blazing sun outside.

“Of course you are,” she sighed. “But if you try to throw me in the shower again, I’ll kick your ass. Literally, I will kick you in the ass.”

“Good luck with that. You’re the mutant equivalent of a fun-sized candy bar – I think I’ll live.”

She glowered at him, but couldn’t hold the expression long – it was only moments before she started laughing. “I don’t think I’ve heard that one before. And goddammit, now I want chocolate.” She actually scowled at the ceiling when they entered what was, for lack of a better term, their room.

“I’ll see what I can do when I’ve made sure your back isn’t raw bacon again,” he said dryly, nudging a kitten off the bed so she could sit on it. The kitten gave him a disinterested stare, sniffed his foot, and wandered off. “Shirt,” he ordered, trying not to sound awkward. Then again, there weren’t many ways to make that _not_ sound awkward.

“Yeah, yeah, give me a minute,” she grumbled, struggling a little. At least she didn’t get her arm stuck this time.

Unfortunately, the bandages were just as nasty as he’d feared. They’d stuck to the scabs in places, which meant he had to soak them with a washcloth before he dared try to remove them. Kitty swore under her breath the entire time, fists clenched so tightly her knuckles went white, and Erik couldn’t help but wince in sympathy. God knew that _he_ knew exactly what this felt like.

“Did you mean it?” he asked, as he carefully washed the worst of the cuts. It bled, but sluggishly, and stopped when he smeared antibiotic ointment over it. She hissed, tensing, but stayed still.

“Did I mean what?” she asked, forcing the words through clenched teeth.

“What you said earlier,” he said quietly, moving on to the next cut. Fortunately, this one wasn’t nearly so deep. “About wishing you’d stayed dead – did you mean it?”

She tried to turn her head to look at him without actually turning around. “That really bugs you, doesn’t it?” she asked. “I meant it when I _was_ dead, but I don’t mean it _now_ , if that’s what you’re worried about. Like I said, you’re not getting rid of me that easy.”

Irrational though it was, he still wasn’t reassured. It must have shown on his face, because she heaved an exasperated sigh. “What do you want, a sworn affidavit? ‘I, Kitty Pryde, do solemnly swear that I won’t commit suicide – which, by the way, that rhymes – nor will I allow myself to be eaten by Cthulu, Yog Soggoth, or the Slender Man.’”

He arched an eyebrow at her. “Don’t be ridiculous,” he said, but he was having a difficult time not laughing.

“Then _you_ don’t be ridiculous,” she retorted. “Seriously, though, I’ll tell you the Slender Man mythos when I deal with your chest. It’s even creepier than the Black-Eyed Children.”

“You,” he intoned, trying to apply fresh gauze without grabbing anything she’d punch him for, “are a strange, strange creature.”

“If you’re actually still surprised by that at this point, I think I’m going to lose all respect for your intelligence,” Kitty said, with a grin that was, strangely, far more comforting than any words or promises. It was a very…Kitty…expression: snarky, deadpan, and slightly evil. He didn’t doubt that it was only a matter of time before Ororo found something horrible in her sock drawer.

Watching – hell, _feeling_ – Kitty die had forced Erik to confront the fact that he was more than just fond of her. That did not, however, mean he was actually going to _admit_ it to anyone. He would stay near her, look after her, and murder anyone who looked at her sideways, but he was certainly not going to tell her why. At least not yet.

\--

By the time evening fell, Charles felt well enough to leave his office. 

It was still too soon, since he’d reacquired his powers. Yes, he’d spent the bulk of his life living with his telepathy, but up until a week ago, he’d been six years without it. Readjusting would have been hard enough under normal circumstances, and the last days especially had hardly been what anyone could call ‘normal’ – or even anything close to sane. He’d needed some time to himself, and he suspected his older self had, as well.

Though the house was finally cooling down, it was quiet. Anathea and her crew – minus Alfred, who was back in the bunker – were splashing in the lawn, spraying each other with the hose. He probably didn’t need to speculate what Rogue and Logan were up to, and he didn’t _want_ to think about what Erik and Kitty might be doing. Some things were just best not contemplated.

Hank, slightly out-of-breath, ran up the corridor behind him. “I think we need to take Clarice to the hospital,” he said. “She went out shopping today, like a complete idiot, and now she’s in such severe abdominal pain that I think she might be bleeding internally.”

That sent a chill through Charles. Even now, the basement haunted them. “Bring her to the car,” he said. “We might be able to get this over with before the rest of the house decides to come with us. I can’t find Ororo, but I’ll ask Kitty to come along.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Hank asked dubiously.

“She’s Clarice’s friend,” Charles replied. “It might be reassuring. Marie and Logan are likely occupied, but I sincerely doubt Kitty is.”

“Occupied?” Hank said, before comprehension dawned. “ _Oh._ Right.” He’d gone a very interesting shade of scarlet. “I’ll go get Clarice.”

Kitty, Charles discovered, was dozing, her mind floating on a sea of painkillers. He debated not saying anything, letting her stay like that, but Clarice really would want a friend with her. He knew that she liked him and Hank, but she didn’t know them like she knew Kitty and Marie.

Unsurprisingly, Kitty jumped at his summons. Equally unsurprisingly, Erik came with her, all but forcing her to lean on his arm and not come limp-running like a complete fool. One of these days, Charles was going to have to accept that the pair came together in an odd, slightly unsettling package.

“I told you that you two should have stayed home,” Erik grumbled, glowering down at the top of her head.

“She’d be bleeding either way,” Kitty retorted. Her tone was aggravated, but the fear in her eyes was very real. “How are we going to hide the fact that she’s a mutant?” she asked. “I mean, the hair we could say is just dye, but her ears and her eyes aren’t exactly normal.

“Let me worry about that,” Charles said. “I can make certain they only see what we want them to see. 

Hank joined them again, carrying a Clarice whose face had gone dead white from pain. They should have taken her to the hospital from the very start – even if the others were too tired to know better, _he_ should have. But then, Charles hadn’t thought of it, either: he’d simply focused on the fact that she was, by some miracle, alive. And he knew that, until now at least, she hadn’t actually been in much pain – mostly because she hadn’t done anything stupid until this morning.

“Your turn to get poked,” Kitty said, clearly trying to keep her voice normal. 

“Yippee,” Clarice muttered, and flinched, as though even speaking pained her. “Guess we were kind of dumbasses for going out today, huh?”

Kitty gave Erik a sharp kick in the ankle, before he could so much as open his mouth. “It happens. We all felt better today. Once we get home, we’ll set you up on the lawn with a beach umbrella, and a Tequila Sunrise without the tequila.”

Charles was relieved that even the idea calmed Clarice a little, and he was equally relieved that the evening air had cooled so much. She shut her eyes when they stepped out into it, a little of the tension leaving her expression.

They laid her down on the backseat, which meant Erik and Kitty had to somehow squash themselves in behind it. He didn’t look tremendously pleased by it, but Charles knew it would be pointless to ask him to remain behind.

Unfortunately, rush hour was still alive and well when they reached the city proper. Though they unrolled all the windows, the car was still stifling; there wasn’t even a hint of a breeze. When Charles turned to look at the backseat, he saw that Clarice had somehow gone even paler. They should have called an ambulance – though it would have been difficult for _it_ to get through this traffic, too. Flashing lights were of little use in gridlock.

Kitty leaned over the back of the seat, brushing the hair away from Clarice’s forehead. “You stay here,” she said quietly. “Look at me, Clarice. I know that ship might be looking pretty good right now, but it’ll pass. You just need to hang on awhile.”

Ship? The way Kitty spoke of it made Charles break his habit of not reading his friends’ minds. He needed to know what she was talking about.

What he found made him pale. He’d wondered just where the pair had gone when they’d died, and from what he saw in Kitty’s head, he could understand why she would feel the need to warn Clarice away from it. The surroundings might simply be strange, but the _feel_ of it – peace such as he had never known in his life, but it was more than that. There was a sense of _home_ , of absolute belonging, which would understandably call to a person who had spent so many years fleeing from danger to danger. 

_Saudade_ , he thought. It was a Portuguese word that had no direct English translation: much deeper than mere nostalgia, it was something so intense it was actively painful. 

“I’m just so tired,” Clarice said, shutting her eyes. “I’m tired of running, of being afraid, of hurting so damn much – and I don’t mean physically. This just…it sucks.”

Kitty grabbed her hand, as gently as she could. “ _I know_ ,” she said, with surprising fervor. “I understand, Clarice. I really do. But Rogue or Sharley or whoever didn’t go to all the trouble of bringing us back just so we could keel over again in less than a week. There’s nothing to be scared of anymore.”

Erik opened his mouth, but winced almost immediately; Kitty must have kicked him again. He was looking at her with a worry entirely out of proportion to the situation – she wasn’t the one who was halfway wishing she was dead – _oh_. That explained it. She wasn’t, but he was terrified that someday she’d wish she was. This could get disturbing in a hurry, and not in the sense that it already was.

“Isn’t there?” Clarice asked. “Sure, we got rid of the shit in France, but what are the odds of it being the only thing like it? Shit always finds us, sooner or later. It’s never going to end.”

“Yeah, it finds us, and then you portal it into space, or Logan stabs it, or Ororo fries it, or I rip its organs out. We’re _home_ , Clarice, and this is friggin’ 1973. There just isn’t the kind of technology people used to attack us in the future. And by the time we get to the future, we’ll have changed it. You need to stick around to see it. The ship’s always going to be there,” she said. “You don’t have to run back to it so fast.”

Clarice actually smiled, which eased some of Charles’s tension. Kitty might be odd and harmlessly vindictive, but she was Clarice’s friend, and said what Clarice needed to hear. “When did you go and get wise?” she asked.

“When I was putting garlic under your throw-rug,” Kitty returned. “Which, yeah, I guess we’ve reached armistice in the prank war. Once you get better, we’ll have to think of something else to do. We need an outsider for a new target.”

Clarice laughed, and immediately winced. “Yeah we do. Are we there yet?”

“Almost,” Hank said. “Just hang in there.”

\--

Kitty would never admit it aloud, but she was fucking terrified.

There was no way the others could hope to understand _why_ she was so afraid. Even the Professor, who could see the ship in her mind, wouldn’t fully get it. Witnessing the ship wasn’t enough – it was a thing that had to be experienced, and aside from Clarice, Kitty was the only one who had. She knew how easily the siren call of it could pull at someone who wasn’t hell-bent on living. 

She’d lied a little, when she’d told Erik that no part of her wanted to go back. The idea wasn’t nearly tempting enough to make her _act_ on it, but there was no way he would understand that – no way that anyone but Clarice could. She knew that if she ever told him the truth, he’d never stop being afraid that she’d jump off the roof someday out of sheer boredom. 

Clarice, injured as she was, seemed far more tempted – and if she really chose to slip away, there was not a damn thing Kitty could do about it. 

Her breathing was already labored, too shallow thanks to what had to be excruciating pain, and if she died, Kitty would never forgive herself. That stupid shopping trip had been her idea, and while Clarice hadn’t protested, she probably wouldn’t have thought of it on her own. If she died, it would be Kitty’s fault.

Which meant she had to be conned into wanting to live. Kitty threw out everything she had in her arsenal, including a spirited (if off-key) rendition of _The Wheels on the Bus_. She knew, though she wasn’t sure why, that keeping Clarice awake was the key. Even with all the painkillers she’d taken, leaning over the back of the seat hurt like a bitch, but it was no less than she deserved for starting this shit.

It seemed to take about five years to reach the hospital, but Clarice stayed awake, and remained so when the triage nurses fetched a gurney. Kitty limped in after her, so close behind one of the nurses that she almost ran into her.

“Are any of you family?” the receptionist asked, shoving a clipboard across the desk.

“She’s my sister,” Kitty said, before anyone else could chime in. “We got in a car accident a few days ago, and she said she felt fine, but she’s obviously…not,” she added, a little lamely.

“I need you to fill these forms out. We’ll take good care of her.”

Kitty wished she could believe that. She knew most of the relevant information, but her hand shook as she wrote. Even the Professor’s preternatural calm couldn’t help her much.

When she’d finished and handed the clipboard back, Erik all but shoved her toward the chairs in the waiting area. “She’ll be fine,” he said, more firmly than she suspected he felt. “This isn’t your fault.”

“Isn’t it?” she asked, looking up at him in total misery. “She wouldn’t have gone running around if it wasn’t for me.”

“Actually, it might be a good thing that you did,” Hank said, sitting on her other side. “If all that moving around hadn’t made her bleeding so obvious, I might not have caught it until it was too late.”

“I hope you’re right,” Kitty muttered, covering her face with her hands.

“Of course he is,” Erik said. “He might be aggravatingly naïve and optimistic, but he does know what he’s talking about.”

“…Thanks,” Hank said. 

“It’s a compliment,” Kitty assured him. “It’s just buried under a couple layers of asshole. And wow, that sounded a lot less terrible in my head.”

“I would imagine quite a few of the things you say sound a lot less terrible in your head,” Erik said dryly. “And if you even think about trying to get up and pace, I’ll ask the nurse to sedate you.”

She glared at him, all the more fiercely because she really was itching to prowl the waiting area. How was she supposed to sit still while they were still waiting for any kind of word? “Jerk,” she said.

“Bitch,” he returned, and started petting her hair like she really was a cat. And goddammit, it was actually kind of soothing – so much so that she gave up and leaned against his side.

“Keep that up and I’ll stay put,” she said. “Otherwise I’m going to go hopping through the walls to find her.”

“That’s blackmail,” he pointed out.

“No, it’s extortion. Blackmail is such an ugly word.”

“So is extortion,” he said, but he kept carding his fingers through her hair. “The best you’re getting off with is coercion.”

She tried to keep her laughter silent. She really did, even though doing so hurt both her back and her ribs. Eventually she gave up, snickering quietly. “That’s what she said.”

\--

Clarice tried to stay awake, but the painkillers the doctor gave her were making that harder by the second. The physical agony stopped, but the mental pain only grew.

It had lingered with her ever since she’d returned to life, and was only growing worse. Kitty said they were home, but this mansion, though it was the same physical place she’d grown up in, was not actually home. If anything, the similarities only made the differences worse.

Ironically, it had been easier when they’d had the threat of the basement looming over them. It was impossible to think to the future, because they had no way of knowing if they would have a future. Now, though…now there was nothing to stop them planning what they’d do with the rest of their lives, and for whatever reason, she just couldn’t do it.

_You need to stay with us_ , Clarice. That was the Professor’s voice, whispering through her mind. _We’ve only been back for two days. Give yourself time to recover, before you even think of planning anything. I can assure you the rest of us don’t have any real idea what to do just now, either. I know that the only thing I want is to rest until the end of summer. We can think of something else once we’re not living in an oven anymore._

She couldn’t help but smile, but it was a faint, fleeting thing. She had no way of explaining to him the pull of the ship, the silent song it sang to lure her back. 

_There are more reasons to stay than there are to go_ , he said gently. _You’re so young, Clarice, and you’ve seen so much hardship. You have a chance now to live a real life. Don’t waste it._

_Will I actually wake up?_ she asked.

_If you want to. They can stop your bleeding, but the rest is up to you. We’re here, and we’re not going anywhere until we know that your condition is stabilized. I think Kitty will stay with you overnight, and I will do my best to keep the others from descending on you like a flock of well-meaning vultures._

That mental image made her smile again – helped quite a bit by the painkillers now free-floating through her system. _Okay_ , she said. _I’ll make sure I wake up. Sooner or later._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Of course it’s not possible to just die and return to life without a few complications. Those are far from over with, unfortunately, and they won’t just affect Kitty and Clarice. Meanwhile, Sharley-the-echo has not forgotten her idea about dealing with Marie’s human lifespan.


	40. Living Dead Girl(s)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe I've hit chapter forty. Damn.
> 
> In which Sharley fills Marie in on a little more, Logan is somewhat ashamed, and Erik and Kitty reveal a few things in their own awkward way (and immediately begin planning how to freak everyone out).

Logan got no further with Marie that afternoon; largely because the heat made her so drowsy he thought a nap would be better than an introduction to the wonders of handjobs. Instead he went and took a shower, and decided to go see if there was anything edible left in the kitchen. 

The house was suspiciously quiet. Anathea and her people rarely made much noise, but he had a hard time believing _nobody_ was up and about. Maybe they’d all gone outside.

Raven was in the kitchen, but she was alone, sitting at the table eating a bowl of cereal. Somehow, the sight of Mystique eating Cheerios was almost more than he could handle.

Except it was almost impossible to think of her as Mystique anymore. Though it had only been a little over a week, he could no longer see her as the cold, viciously amoral woman he’d known in the future. The torture that had hardened her into that person hadn’t happened in this timeline, and though he was sure she was just as adrift at the moment as the rest of them, she didn’t look likely to hare off and murder someone.

“The hell is everybody?” he asked, grabbing a beer – the second-to-last, he noted. “Woulda thought somebody’d set somethin’ on fire by now.”

“Hank and Charles took Clarice to the hospital,” she said. “Kitty and Erik went with them.”

He went still. “Why the _hell_ did nobody tell me and Marie? Clarice is our friend, too.”

She gave him a deadpan stare that was rendered quite creepy by her yellow eyes. “They probably figured you were busy.”

“…Oh.” Well, that was a fair enough point, but still – somebody should have told them. Marie would want to go to the hospital to see her, and they had no car. She certainly wasn’t going to be up for anymore bedroom shenanigans, and he could understand why. He didn’t think he was, either. “What happened?”

“Hank thinks it’s internal bleeding,” she said, “left over from, you know, dying.”

Logan winced. How the hell had none of them thought of that? He knew, to his own shame, why _he_ hadn’t: he’d been pretty fixated on one goal, to the exclusion of, well, pretty much everything else. If she didn’t pull through, he didn’t think any of them would ever forgive themselves.

He had to go wake Marie up. They could get a taxi, and be glad that rush hour was long over. The Professor was going to have to get a second car, so things like this wouldn’t happen again.

Marie was not particularly happy about being woken up, and gave him a look of groggy annoyance until he explained himself. _Then_ she scrambled out of bed, threw on the rest of her clothes, and hunted up her gloves. “Why in fuck didn’t anyone tell us?” she demanded, stuffing her feet into a pair of sandals. 

“Apparently, they didn’t want to interrupt,” he said dryly. “The fact that nobody’s called home yet is probably a good thing, though. If anythin’ terrible’d happened, we’d know.”

“Is Ororo still not home? I’m sure she woulda gone with, if she was. If she was anybody else, I wouldn’t trust her not to do somethin’ stupid.”

By this point, Logan wasn’t so sure. He’d been so preoccupied and single-minded that he hadn’t really done an observational checkup of everyone else, which was very unlike him; he might not be able to read emotions worth a damn, but everybody had their tells. But then again, they _all_ smelled like exhaustion and pain – he wouldn’t have been able to read the subtleties without really concentrating. This was, unfortunately, still a really piss-poor excuse.

After he’d called for a taxi, the pair of them waited at the head of the driveway, watching the sunset. At least the night air was wonderfully cool, and a very slight breeze had come up, whispering through the leaves of the huge trees.

Marie leaned against him, frowning. “You think she’ll be okay?” she asked, looking up at him with wide, anxious eyes.

“No way of knowin’ yet,” he said, unable to be anything but honest with her. “Not until there’s somebody to ask. But if it was really bad, it woulda been obvious before now.” He hoped so, anyway; she’d had her guts fatally rearranged, and he doubted there would have been any way to see just what had really happened afterward without an MRI of her abdomen. 

Sure, Kitty had died, too, but her wounds had been very obvious, and all confined to the surface. He was pretty sure none of the Memories had actively tried to rip her apart. Honestly, he wasn’t certain which death would have been worse: Clarice had been all but eviscerated, but at least she would have died in a hurry. Kitty’s, from what Logan had gathered, had been drawn out and agonizing, but her injuries were much more easily healed when she came back, and visible where Clarice’s were not.

“I’d kill for a cell phone,” Marie said, half to herself. “Amazin’, how much technology I just took for granted in the future, before everythin’ went to shit. Hell, even _after_ I went to the camps, there were machines and…things…right outta a sci-fi novel.”

Logan wrapped his arm around her, giving her shoulder a comforting rub. “Look at it this way,” he said. “Now you get to witness all that crap while it’s first invented. You’ll laugh your ass off when you the 80’s call a cell phone, and a computer. Must seem like the Dark Ages to you.”

Marie tried to smile, but the result was flat. “Dunno,” she said thoughtfully. “Much as I want a cell phone right now, I almost wonder if the world’s not better without all that stuff. There’s not really any way for the outside world to spy on us in the school, you know? Sure, there’s infrared, but that’s about it. All anyone can see with _that_ is that there’s people in the school, and they don’t have any way of tellin’ mutants from humans unless one of us looks different. We don’t have to _hide_ like we do in the future.”

She had a point. There was no way of knowing if that would ever change this time around, but for right now, the only genetic testing done on mutants had been done by Trask, and Logan was pretty sure the rest of the world thought he was insane by now. With luck, nobody would take him or his ‘research’ seriously now. The rest of them could pass pretty easily, or would be able to soon – punk was in its infancy, so soon enough Clarice would have plenty of excuses for her appearance. Even the ears they could pass off as plastic surgery.

Provided she survived. If she pulled through, they had to make sure – all of them – that she knew just how many good things would come along, in time. Sure, they’d all been in shock the last two days, but they couldn’t all keep wandering off in their own directions. The X-Men still had to happen, and they were all here this time around to help found the group. They had to start actively planning for their future.

\--

Clarice was in surgery for so long that Kitty was practically chewing off her own knuckles with worry.

The Professor had assured her that he’d spoken to Clarice, and had convinced her that she needed to stay with them, to keep on living, but Kitty herself was _not_ convinced. Not when she knew just how tempting the ship really was. 

Lacking the ability to pace – she knew that if Erik didn’t try to stop her, the Professor would – she drummed her feet against the legs of her chair, and almost unconsciously gnawed on her own hand. Erik had put a stop to that when he saw that her knuckles were actually bleeding, and she didn’t have the heart to fight him on it.

Erik himself had gone unusually quiet, his well of snark and insults apparently dried up. By now she could read him well enough to know that he was tense as hell, and that he would probably sooner have his fingernails ripped out before he’d admit to it. He had to be the most emotionally repressed person she’d ever met in her life, and that was really, really saying something. He made _Logan_ look positively open and expressive.

It was for the best, though – she didn’t think she could have borne any of his wisecracks at the moment. All she wanted was to run through the walls until she found Clarice, and if he’d taken any verbal shots, she might have done it, consequences be damned.

“It shouldn’t be taking this long,” she said, curling up in her chair, and wincing at the pain in her back and her ribs. “Not unless there’s something really wrong.”

“If there were complications, someone would have told us,” Hank said. “Surgery just takes time. Even if the procedure needed is simple, they still want to make certain there’s absolutely nothing else wrong. They’re not going to want to have to open her up again if they discover something they’ve missed later.”

Kitty shuddered. She really didn’t need that mental image, but she couldn’t get rid of it now.

“Thank you, Hank,” Erik said caustically, and carded his fingers through her hair in what she was sure he meant to be a comforting gesture. It sort of worked, too. “That was perfect right up until the last sentence.” 

Hank winced. “Sorry,” he said. “But you know what I mean. They’re just being thorough.”

Kitty did know what he meant, but that didn’t banish the horrors her imagination had summoned. “Professor, are you sure she really wants to come back?” she asked. “I mean, I know you have the…you know, but you don’t know her like I do. She might have just been saying what she wanted you to hear.” Wow, that was a lot of ‘knows’. Oh well.

“She felt sincere,” he promised. “It wasn’t just the call of the ship. Now that the danger has passed, she feels lost. I assured her that we all do, too, and that we have time to find our way.”

Lost. Had Kitty herself actually felt lost? She wasn’t sure. Granted, she’d spent most of her time since France napping or trading verbal volleyballs with Erik. She hadn’t had much opportunity to feel a great deal of anything – well, anything except pain, but somehow she’d got used to even that. “We really do need to get her a beach umbrella and a Tequila Sunrise without the tequila,” she said decidedly. “Now that all the shit is over, we have to remind her that this is actually a pretty good world to live in. Even if the fashion is horrible.”

“You’re never going to let that go, are you?” Erik asked.

“One word for you, dude: paisley,” she said, and yawned. Tense though she was, she was also exhausted.

He snorted, and shifted her like a sack of flour until her head rested on his shoulder. “Go the fuck to sleep, little cat,” he said. “You sound more insane than usual.”

“Oh, bite me,” she grumbled, but her eyelids were too heavy for her to lobby any more creative responses.

“That,” he said dryly, “would be both disgusting and completely counterproductive. I’ll wake you up when there’s anything worth hearing.”

“You’d better,” she muttered, but sleep took her before she could say anything more.

\--

The closer the cab drew to the hospital, the more nervous Marie grew.

She’d been afraid of her friends dying _before_ France, but it hadn’t occurred to her to worry about what would happen once it was over. She was too relieved, and, quite frankly, too giddy about finally getting to spend a little alone time with Logan. Sharley had brought Clarice and Kitty back, and Marie had naively assumed that was all there was to it.

But was it really naïve? It wasn’t like she knew a damn thing about death and resurrection, and Sharley hadn’t said anything about potential complications – at least, not beyond a warning to take it easy for a while. If Sharley’s echo was still in her head, she was keeping awfully quiet, and Marie hoped that wasn’t a bad sign.

 _Come on, Sharley_ , she thought. _Talk to me. Tell me Clarice is going to be okay._

 _I can’t,_ Sharley said. _I wish I could, but I can’t. The thing is, what I did – what_ we _did – isn’t supposed to happen. I’ve done it before, but not in your world, so I can’t say just what other consequences might happen. Theoretically, there won’t be any._

“Theoretically?” Marie said aloud, ignoring the cab driver’s startled glance in the rearview mirror. “That’s not very reassurin’.”

_I know it’s not, and I’m sorry. I was gonna try to get you and Logan to go to the Other with me – with the real me – but I think we maybe ought to bring Kitty and Clarice, too. I’ll never hear the end of it from my dad or my foster-mother, but they can fix whatever I’ve broken._

_Why did you want to drag Logan and me over?_ Marie asked. She didn’t know if she should be worried by that, but figured it would probably be best to be, just in case.

_Logan’s gonna live a damn long time. You’re not. I’d like to do somethin’ about that._

Can _you_? Marie asked, incredulous.

_Well, not me personally, but I know people. The same people who are gonna be supremely pissed at me for what I did with Kitty and Clarice, but whatever. My foster-mother might swear like a sailor, but she’s damn near a saint, and my dad…well, he’s a grade-A asshole, but he owes me, and he owes me big time. Between the two of ’em, they can fix your whole ‘fragile mortal’ problem._

Quite honestly…Marie wasn’t sure what she thought about that. The last thing she wanted to do was die and leave Logan, but did she really want to live forever?

 _You wouldn’t be really immortal_ , Sharley said. _Logan’s not – he’s just tough as leather and ages like a snail. I wouldn’t wish immortality on anyone._ There was a surprising viciousness in her tone, and it made Marie wonder. The Stranger had showed them all how Sharley died, yet Sharley was definitely alive…ish. She walked, talked, and thought, but the one time Marie had seen her, she sure as hell didn’t look like a living creature. If anything, she’d looked unsettlingly like a corpse, but not quite – there was more to her, in a sense Marie couldn’t have hoped to explain even to herself. 

_Living dead girl_ , Sharley said dryly. _I guess you could call me that. Your two friends are, too, just…not nearly the same way. I didn’t know that when they died, they’d spend a while in the Other – I didn’t know where they’d go. The problem is that once the Other gets ahold of a person, it doesn’t wanna let go. You’ve gotta make sure they want to stay where they are, because if it gets to them before real-me does, it’ll lure ’em back. And if it succeeds, they’re dead – and I can’t bring ’em back this time._

“So much for a nice, peaceful summer,” Marie muttered. “I’ll explain when we get there,” she said, when Logan gave her a curious look. “Shit’s not over.”

“Of course it’s not,” he sighed. “It’s not the same shit, is it?”

“Nope, but it’s related. Startin’ to think you and me got off light.”

“Didn’t need to hear that.”

“I didn’t need to _know_ that, but here we are. I guess here we _actually_ are, too,” she added, as the taxi pulled into the hospital’s parking lot. “I hope she’s awake. I hope it wasn’t as much as I’m afraid it was.”

Logan paid the cabdriver, and said nothing. Marie was sure her hopes were foolish, but she couldn’t help it.

She followed him to the emergency room, wrinkling her nose at the scent of chemicals and sickness: her borrowed feral senses were, unfortunately, still quite keen. The smell only got stronger the further in they went, and she fought an urge to pull the collar of her shirt up over her nose.

The waiting area was surprisingly empty. Marie would have thought such a big hospital would be constantly crowded – but then, this was 1973. Violence happened, but not on the scale it did when she was younger, and this wasn’t exactly New York City proper. At least it meant there were fewer stinky humans to add to her burgeoning chemical headache.

The Professor, Hank, Kitty, and Erik were sitting against the farthest wall. Three of them looked varying shades of worried and uncomfortable; the fourth, Kitty, was asleep. That was probably the only reason Logan didn’t lay into them all for keeping the two of them out of the loop.

Erik gave them a look that, while silent, managed to convey quite a bit: it didn’t need words to say _oh, you’ve decided to join the rest of us mortals?_ Marie met it with a glare, though hers wasn’t half so blistering as Logan’s.

“How long has she been in surgery?” she asked, sitting at Hank’s left side. 

“A little under three hours,” he said. “No news yet, but that’s probably a good thing. We’d know by now if anything had gone wrong.”

“How long can it take to patch up some leaks?” Logan asked. “I mean, it couldn’t have been anythin’ _too_ bad, or it’d have showed up before now, right?”

Hank glanced at Kitty, who was still very much asleep. “Not necessarily,” he said quietly. “Not if it was a slow bleed. Marie, what exactly did you do, when…you know?”

She sighed. “Actually, Sharley had some things to say about that. She called Kitty and Clarice Living Dead Girls, and said that what she did with ’em technically wasn’t supposed to be done. We need to take ’em into the Other so they can get looked at.” She looked at Erik, and dreaded what she had to say next. “She also told me that we’ve gotta be careful to keep ’em here – make sure they wanna stay here – or the Other’ll call ’em back when they sleep. Fatally.”

Marie still didn’t know him well enough to anticipate how he’d react to that. Would he explode? Would he panic? Would he randomly murder the first passerby? As Logan had put it, Erik and Kitty might not be _that_ , but they were _something_ , and she’d just told him Kitty might die in her sleep at any moment. If he decided to flip the fuck out, she wouldn’t blame him.

For a moment, he did indeed look like he could easily slaughter the entire hospital. She had never, ever seen that level of sheer rage on a human face, and she’d spent many years around _Logan_. Something about it actually made her recoil – it was a cold thing, almost reptilian, and she abruptly remembered why so many people were so goddamn afraid of him in the future.

He did nothing, however – it was at least a minute before he even spoke. When he finally did move, it was to shake Kitty’s shoulder until she woke up and glared at him. “Don’t die,” he said.

“The fuck are you talking about?” she asked, rubbing her eyes and wincing.

“Don’t die,” he repeated. “Marie just told me that the Other might call you back in your sleep and kill you, so don’t let it. I would have to go get you, and nobody wants that.” 

His words were casual, and borderline sarcastic, but the tone of his voice…Marie fought a shudder. The thing most likely to regret any trip he might take to the Other would _be_ the Other.

Kitty blinked up at him, though Marie couldn’t tell if she was surprised or just groggy. “I’d pay to see that,” she said, “but I’ll try not to die anyway. I do sort of like it here.”

“Kitty, he’s serious,” Marie said, realizing the full importance of the warning just wasn’t sinking in. “If you go there again – before Sharley gets us, I mean – you can’t come back. You or Clarice.”

“I kind of figured that,” Kitty said, struggling to sit up properly. Erik did not seem inclined to let her. “Probably aren’t many people who could cheat death twice. Unless they’re Logan, anyway,” she added. “Did you two kids have fun?”

Marie was appalled to feel a blush creeping up her face. She didn’t dare look at Logan, for fear that she’d start giggling like a teenage girl.

“Kitty,” Erik said, before she could torment Marie any further, “look at me. Can you honestly – and I mean really, truly, all-hyperbole-aside honestly – tell me that no part of you is tempted to go back to that ship? That you really are as indifferent as you say?”

Kitty did look at him, but she didn’t answer right away. “No,” she admitted, “I can’t. If you’d been there, you wouldn’t be able to, either.”

He gave her a long, hard, silent stare, before his eyes flicked to the rest of them. “Let’s take a walk,” he said, helping her to her feet. “You and I need to talk.”

Kitty snorted. “Nice rhyme. We can’t go too far, though, because I want to hear as soon as Clarice is out of surgery.”

“I’ll let you know,” the Professor said. “Perhaps you’d like to go outside?”

Erik gave him a deeply suspicious look, but said nothing, opting instead to half-lead, half-carry Kitty out the sliding doors. As much as Marie would like to be a fly on the wall for that conversation, they really ought to have some privacy.

She glanced at Logan, and took his hand in hers. Thank God they were so straightforward – but then, they’d had their share of awkwardness and flat-out denial over the years. What they had now, they’d earned, and they’d done it the very hard way – and their relationship was perhaps all the stronger because of it. When she’d been younger and far more naïve, she thought that maybe things wouldn’t have worked out as well between them as they did now.

He gave her a half-grin, and she was sure he knew what she was thinking. He was good at that.

\--

Charles was more worried than he wanted to let on.

Clarice was trying – he could feel that much, at least. She was consciously resolute about staying with them, but she was slipping and she didn’t even know it. The damage of her uncertainty had already been done, and he couldn’t fight it for her. She had to hold onto her own reasons to stay, because no amount of projecting his – or anyone’s – would be enough. 

Clarice was a strong woman, but the force the pulled at her now was stronger than perhaps any living creature in this world. Whether she would live or die ultimately boiled down to how long she remained unconscious, which meant he was going to have to wake her up as soon as the surgery was over. She was going to hate it, but he hoped she would thank him later.

Perhaps Kitty was right when she said the pair of them needed a new target to prank. While he pitied the target, it would certainly keep Clarice focused. The problem would be finding someone who actually _deserved_ such a fate, because the two of them could probably drive someone mad within a week if they put their minds to it. He dreaded what would happen if anyone already in the mansion pissed them off enough.

 _Hold on, Clarice_ , he told her, though she wouldn’t be able to hear him through the anesthesia. _Just hold on a while longer._

\--

Most of Erik’s psyche would rather he ripped his own teeth out than have this particular conversation, but desperate times called for desperate measures, and if it would keep Kitty’s consciousness from haring off and leaving her dead…well, he didn’t see how he had much choice. 

Dammit.

The night air had cooled off significantly, but it was nowhere near chilly – it just meant that they wouldn’t sweat to death while they walked. Well, while _he_ walked; Kitty was still pulling an odd combination of limping and hopping. Maybe she was used to it by now, because while she looked aggravated, she didn’t look agonized.

“You have to stay here,” he said, guiding her – more or less – to a bench. “You have to stay alive. I’d be…upset…if you died,” he added, and was irritated at his own awkwardness. Up until he’d met this damn woman, he’d never felt awkward in his life.

She raised her eyebrows, wincing a little as she sat down. “Are you even capable of actually getting _upset_?” she asked, doubt thick in her voice. “I mean, actually upset? I kind of figured annoyance was your default state. I know some things, well…bug you… a lot, but ‘upset’ is not a word I’d associate with you.”

He fought an urge to grind his teeth. He didn’t think she was being deliberately obtuse, or he might have just given up. “I’m…fond…of you, all right?” he said, barely managing to force the words out. “More than fond, to my own annoyance, and if you went and died in your sleep, I’m honestly not quite sure what I’d do. Except march into the Other and drag you back.”

Kitty eyed him a moment, her expression totally unreadable – and then she burst out laughing. “Is that it?” she asked. “I’m _fond_ of you too, you jerk. I figured that if you didn’t already know that, it was because you didn’t want to. Though now that we’ve got this out in the open, don’t think I’m going to stop giving you shit. Like I said in France, I’m bad at this whole… _this_.”

He was so relieved that it was absolutely ridiculous. She’d spared him the awkwardness of actually spelling it out – which was a good thing, because he honestly wasn’t sure he could have. He might be even worse at _this_ than she was. “As long as we’re on the same page,” he said. “And if you stopped, as you say, giving me shit, you wouldn’t be _you_ anymore. I don’t think I could stop taunting you if I tried.”

“Figured as much,” she said dryly. “Like I’ve been saying, you’re not getting rid of me that easy. Ah, hell,” she groaned. “Rogue and Clarice are going to be totally insufferable. They’ve been bugging me about… _this_ …since we got here. Even if they’re honestly a little creeped out by us.”

Erik was quite sure a few other people would be, too – namely, Logan, but no doubt Charles would have something to say. Then again…

“I think _everyone_ finds us creepy already,” he said, running his fingers through her hair. “How would you feel about making that much, much worse?”

She gave him one of her patented Kitty grins – devious, gleeful, and ever-so-slightly evil. “You’re on,” she said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoo boy. It’s fortunate Logan and Marie are so sweet, because Erik and Kitty are in fact going to joyfully freak everyone the hell out. At least it will keep Clarice distracted and in the game, until they can go to the Other and get their souls properly anchored.


	41. Dreamwalking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Kitty and Clarice attempt to avoid dying in the Other, Erik and Kitty lay the groundwork for royally creeping everyone out, and Marie begins to learn a little bit more about just what gaining Logan’s not-quite-immortality really means.

_Clarice didn’t think she was dreaming._

_Oh, she knew she wasn’t_ awake, _but this didn’t feel like a dream. It was as clear and vivid as the ship, but it was most definitely_ not _the ship: she was standing in the middle of a swamp, the path before and behind her the only solid ground there was to be seen._

_The place was familiar, though she knew she’d never been here before – she was pretty sure she’d remember that. It took a moment for realization to click, and once it did, she was…worried. She knew she’d seen it – or rather, the edge of it – in Sharley’s last living memories._

_Huh._

_The peace here was not nearly as strong as it was on the ship. She felt safe, yes, and welcome, but the feeling of home, that was so compelling, was absent. While she was tempted to explore, she was not tempted to stay._

_Having nothing else to do, she wandered down the path. The pools of water on either side were smooth as glass, puddles of inky blackness that reflected the strings of lanterns that wove through the trees: merely blue at first, but growing more and more multicolored the further in she went. Though it was damp, nothing smelled of mold – instead there was the scent of smoke, and an assortment of spices she couldn’t hope to name._

_As on the ship, there were no visible people. She could_ feel _them – she knew she wasn’t alone – but there was nobody to be seen. And maybe that was a good thing – maybe she wouldn’t want to see what actually lived in the Other._

_Something – someone – darted across the path, and paused when it saw her. It was a little girl, maybe five years old, and she would have been absolutely adorable if she wasn’t very obviously dead. Her hair was tow-colored blonde, and very long, with bangs cut straight across her forehead, and her eyes were dark – though one had a section of bright blue, and the other a chunk of lighter brown. They would have been pretty, if they hadn’t been filmed over with death-cataracts. Her skin was pallid and bloodless, and her throat was slashed halfway across._

_She didn’t appear to be actually decaying, but she was still horrifying – at first, anyway. Once Clarice’s brain had wrapped itself around the fact that she was looking at a goddamn zombie, it noticed that her expression was as animated as a living child’s, those white-filmed eyes staring at Clarice with open curiosity._

_“You aren’t supposed to be here,” the girl said, and though her throat was half destroyed, her voice sounded ordinary enough. Weirdly, her accent was Southern; it didn’t sound much different than Rogue’s. “You’re one of the ones Mama’s gonna get in trouble for, huh?”_

_Mama? She had to mean Sharley, because once Clarice’s mind kicked itself into properly functioning again, she recognized this girl as the child that had died in Sharley’s arms, in the memory the Stranger had shown them all. Whatever had brought this kid back, it hadn’t been the same as what resurrected her and Kitty._

_“Why would she get in trouble?” Clarice asked, wary. The little girl didn’t look at all likely to hurt her, but she’d learned the hard way that you really never could be too careful._

_“For bringin’ you here and then takin’ you back,” the child said solemnly. “That’s not how the Other’s supposed to work. ’Course, half the time nobody knows how it actually is supposed to work, and I’m sure Mama’ll point that out. You stay in the Swamp and not on the ship, and you might not get as stuck as you would if you went to the ship. Mama Tanya’ll make sure you get home when you wake up.”_

_Part of Clarice wanted to ask, but most of her…really didn’t. Especially she knew she would find out sooner or later, whether she wanted to or not. “What happens if I do die?” she asked eventually. “If my…soul…stays here, and I die in my own world?” Would she be stuck in the Other forever?_

_The little girl shrugged. “Beats me,” she said. “Nobody’s ever done this before. That happens a lot around here, though, and if Mama doesn’t deal with it, one of the other three will. You don’t have to be scared of anythin’ in the Swamp, but I wouldn’t go outside it.”_

_Well, that wasn’t nearly as reassuring as she thought the girl probably meant it to be. She wasn’t sure if this was better or worse than the shit in France._

_Something tapped on her shoulder, and she almost screamed. She whirled around to find herself faced with a very tall woman, not quite as corpselike as the girl, but definitely not properly alive, either. Her eyes were much like the child’s, completely mismatched, but there was no film of death over them._

_“Hi, Mama,” the little girl said cheerfully._

_“Hi, Marty,” the woman said, but those odd eyes were fixed on Clarice. There was a completely inhuman intensity to them – they practically burned. “I need you to talk to Marie,” she said. “You need to tell her that she’s got to have a word with me – with actual me, not the one in her head. She’s gonna need your older telepath to do it, because I’m not draggin’ you all in here just yet. There’s some shit goin’ on that you don’t need to be a part of, but it means you and Kitty are gonna have to hang on a little longer in your own world.”_

_Because that sounded so very easy. “Okay,” Clarice said, more than a little uneasy. “So…what do I do, while I’m here? Before I wake up?”_

_Sharley gave her a grin that was absolutely terrifying. It wasn’t an evil expression, or a vicious one; it was frightening because it was the only truly human thing about her. “You can come with me,” she said. “My life sure as hell isn’t boring, and you’ll want to know some about the Other, before you really come here.”_

_Clarice probably ought to be afraid of that. Shit, if she had an ounce of self-preservation, she’d tie herself to one of these trees until she woke up. She’d been wishing for everything to go back to normal, insofar as there ever was a normal with her group, but somehow, the thought of trailing this odd woman was too good to pass up. “I’m probably going to regret saying this,” she said, “but okay. Let’s do it.”_

\--

Clarice was out of surgery, but Charles still couldn’t make contact with her mind. Lying in her bed in the recovery room, she was vacant and completely motionless – only the faint beeping of her cardio-monitor signaled that she was even alive.

She was still there, but her mind was wandering somewhere so far away that he couldn’t find it. He was tempted to go back to the mansion and try Cerebro, but somehow he doubted that would work. Wherever she’d gone, she was going to have to come back of her own accord.

“How come she’s not awake yet?” Kitty asked. She’d kept nodding off herself, only to have Erik poke her awake every time, until she looked ready to murder him. While something in their dynamic had changed – something Charles did not want to contemplate – it appeared a few things remained the same, chief among them being the fact that Erik still had the ability to drive her to complete aggravation.

“Anesthesia doesn’t wear off in a hurry,” Hank said. “She just went through major surgery. If she woke up right now, she’d be in a lot of pain.”

“Yeah, but she’d be _alive_ ,” Logan said. 

“She’s alive now,” Charles assured them. “Her consciousness is wandering, but it’s still tethered to her. I can feel her – I just can’t _find_ her.”

“I could try,” Kitty said, leveling a glower at Erik, “if _somebody_ would just let me _go the fuck to sleep._ You can always wake me up if I start to die.”

“No, I don’t think so,” he said dryly. To Charles’s immense discomfort, he brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. “I won’t exactly know if you’re about to die, after all.”

“I have to sleep sometime,” she protested. “Professor’s right here – he can tell if I’m close to kicking the bucket.”

Charles looked away, and noticed that every other person in the room who was actually awake looked as uncomfortable as he felt. At least he wasn’t alone. “I can,” he said. “And she’s right – she can’t stay awake forever.”

Erik looked incredibly dubious, but Kitty looked incredibly cranky, and her crankiness won out. “Don’t even,” she warned. “Come on, I’m fucking exhausted.”

He rolled his eyes. “Fine. But don’t you dare die.” He pulled her onto his lap, head against his chest, and seemed rather determined to keep her there.

 _Awkward_ , Charles thought. _Awkward and wrong._

\--

In spite of the gravity of the entire situation, it was all Erik could do not to laugh.

He’d warned Kitty this wouldn’t work if she couldn’t keep a straight face, but so far she was doing a better job of that than he was. Even Logan was looking visibly uncomfortable, and oh, how hard it was not to smile at that.

While he genuinely was worried about letting Kitty sleep, he trusted Charles. Meanwhile, he got to watch everyone else try not to squirm. He wasn’t quite sure just what it was that made the two of them so creepy to everyone else, but he would happily capitalize on it, because why not? God knew he had nothing better to do. He understood why Clarice would feel so lost – he had no idea what to do now, and he was studiously avoiding thinking about the future. For now, he’d settle for discomfiting everyone he knew, and the future could do what it wanted.

\--

_Kitty didn’t have to do anything to find Clarice – she almost landed right on top of her._

_“What the – oh, hi Kitty.” Clarice stood, brushing dead fir needles off her shirt. “Erik actually let you fall asleep?”_

_Kitty hauled herself off the ground. At least in her sleep she wasn’t actually injured – being free of pain was, by now, definitely a novelty. “He didn’t have much choice,” she said, looking around. While this was definitely the Other, it wasn’t the ship – she was surrounded by forest, huge fir trees gone reddish-bronze. They were dying, as were the patches of grass between them, parching in the dry heat. “How come we’re not on the – oh.” She fell silent when she saw that Clarice was not alone. “Um. Hi.”_

_“Sharley, this is Kitty. Kitty, Sharley.”Clarice actually sounded at ease, and Kitty had no idea how she could. The damn woman was almost as tall as Logan, and the fact that there was nothing malevolent – or even particularly harsh – in her expression somehow made her even more terrifying._

_At first. Though there was faint amusement far back in Sharley’s mismatched eyes, there was a strange sort of sadness about her as well. She looked at Kitty and Clarice as though they both brought her pain. She was, in fact, looking at Kitty far more closely than Kitty was strictly comfortable with, as though trying to read something in her face – or maybe in her soul. Kitty had seen enough weird shit lately that she wouldn’t be surprised._

_Sharley smiled. “Good to actually meet you, Kitty. I’ve got Clarice with me so she doesn’t die here in her sleep, so you’d best come, too. We’re gonna go see my dad.”_

_“Why?” Kitty asked, wondering just what kind of father this woman might have._

_“She wants to make Rogue immortal,” Clarice said, barley able to keep the glee out of her voice._

_“Not immortal,” Sharley said sharply. “Never immortal. You guys – you humans – you have no idea what the word 'immortal' really means. I’m just gonna try to match her lifespan to Logan’s, so they don’t have only sixty-odd years together. As for you two, I need both of ’em to anchor your souls back right. Can’t do that on my own, unfortunately.”_

_Sixty-odd years seemed like a long time to Kitty, but it probably didn’t to Logan, or to…whatever Sharley was. “Your dad can do that?”_

_“Him and my foster-mom, but we’re goin’ to him first, because I actually know where he is. Much as he pisses me off, at least he stays_ put. _Jary – foster-mom – she’s got her airship, and I only ever know she’ll be where I don’t want her. Her ship’s where you two were, when you were dead.”_

_Well. That was probably food for thought, but Kitty couldn’t focus on it right now. “What do they do, that makes them able to do…whatever…to Rogue’s lifespan?” She knew she sounded like a curious child, but this was the first thing since long before they came to 1973 that actually seemed worth getting excited over._

_Sharley looked down at her, and shook her head with a wry smile. “My father is Death,” she said, “and my foster-mother is Life. I need both of ’em on board with me, before I can try to do much of anythin’ else.”_

_“Death,” Kitty said flatly. “Your father is Death, and we’re on our way to see him? Clarice and I, who are already trying_ not _to die here? Isn’t that kind of spitting on Fate?”_

_“He won’t do anythin’ to you,” Sharley said, and gestured for them to follow when she started off through the trees. “C’mon, keep up. He’s not the one that wants you back here. That’s the Other itself. It’s a greedy little shit, but it won’t cross me.”_

_Kitty could well believe that. She barely knew Sharley, and she’d never want to cross her. Oh, she seemed friendly enough, but she was sort of dead, could manipulate Time, and had had (at one point, at least) the Stranger in her head. Two out of those three were not exactly conducive to sanity – and that was without the voices, or whatever they were, that had followed her the day she died. That hadn’t exactly been clear in the memory the Stranger had showed them, but Kitty was pretty certain that Sharley was at least a little crazy. Trustworthy, at least so far, but kind of crazy._

_Did Clarice realize that? Rogue almost certainly did, since she had an echo of Sharley in her mind. The woman might be their ally, but she was probably more dangerous than any of them yet realized. Hopefully that wouldn’t bite them all in the ass later._

_“How can you extend Rogue’s lifespan, without actually making her immortal?” Clarice asked, struggling to keep up. Sharley’s long stride wasn’t quite possible for the shorter women to match – which she must have realized, because she slowed down._

_“Logan’s is down to his healin’ factor,” she said. “Now, we’re used to dealin’ with magic rather than mutation, but I’ve never yet found anythin’ Jary couldn’t work with. What I’m thinkin’ is that she’ll mutate Marie’s mutation even further – it oughtta be fairly easy, since she’s already borrowed Logan’s. Jary just has to make it stick, but my dad has to build in the…off switch, I guess you’d call it. Logan can die, and eventually old age will get him – just a very, very long time from now. While I have once known a man who aged as slow as him, that guy did it artificially, and he didn’t have Logan’s healin’. Which was a damn good thing, because he was hard enough to kill as it was.”_

_Kitty didn’t want to ask. She really, really didn’t. She had a hard time dealing with the troubles of her own world – getting embroiled in someone else’s was just not a thing she was capable of. “Why not just make them both immortal?” she asked. “I mean, it sounds like you – they – could do that.”_

_Sharley stopped in her tracks, and bent the full force of her strange eyes on Kitty. It was almost enough to make Kitty quail. “Like I told Clarice,” she said, “I wouldn’t wish immortality on anyone. You people, you humans – you have no real concept of just what immortality really means. It’s not something to be envied – or at least, it isn’t if you weren’t made like that at the start. Which is somethin’ my dad didn’t realize, after I’d died as a human.”_

_“What’s so wrong with it?” Kitty asked, before she could help herself._

_Sharley sighed. “I don’t breathe,” she said. “Not really – not unless I talk. When you’re immortal like I am – and that’s the only way either my dad or Jary knows how to do it – you can’t sleep, you can’t cry, and you’d be surprised at how much you miss havin’ a heartbeat. There are so many things that mortal humans take for granted until they lose them. No, you can’t die, but you don’t feel really alive, either.”_

_Well, when you put it like_ that _…Kitty had no idea what to say to that, so for a long while she said nothing. When she finally did speak, she said, “Ouch. Sorry.”_

_Sharley gave her a faint, fleeting smile. “It’s okay,” she said. “There’s no way you could have known. But that’s why they’re not gonna live forever – I don’t know where humans go when they die, but they deserve to have the chance to find out.”_

_Kitty would never have thought of it that way, but it made sense. When put in that way, she didn’t think she’d want to live forever, either. “I can’t believe I’m saying this,” she said, “but let’s meet your dad. If he won’t actually kill Clarice and I…well, how many people get to meet Death before he turns up at the, um, end?”_

_Sharley laughed. “More than you’d think, but still, not many. C’mon, while you’re still asleep.”_

\--

Marie watched Kitty and Clarice, and wondered how they were doing in the Other.

 _Other-me has probably found ’em_ , Sharley said. _She – I – will look after ’em. You need to crash soon, too, so I can show you where we’ll go, when I take you there. I can’t give you anythin’ new, but I can show you my memories._

She was probably right, but Marie didn’t think she’d be able to sleep any time soon. She was too wired on adrenaline and worry, even though Logan had his arm around her – mostly because she still felt horribly guilty about not checking with Clarice when they got home. Sure, Sharley had said they’d be fine if they took it easy, but they’d hardly put Clarice on bed rest when they probably should have. 

No, she wasn’t Hank, wasn’t a doctor, but Clarice was her friend, and had been her friend for years – Marie should have at least looked in on her. She’d been focused so intently on herself and Logan – and the things they’d finally be able to do with one another – that she’d neglected everything else. And while they were not her responsibility, she felt guilty nonetheless.

 _Don’t_ , Sharley said gently. _This isn’t your fault. If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s mine, for not rememberin’ just how fragile you people actually are. If I’d actually thought about how squishy your insides are, I’d have told you to take her to the hospital before you even left France. Aside from Logan – and you, right now – you guys are scarily breakable. It’s easy to forget that, if I’m not around you a lot. Clarice’ll pull through, though. She’s got a tough mind, even if, from my perspective, she might as well physically be made of glass. Humans kinda got shafted there – your minds can handle so much more than your bodies._

 _What is it you want to do with my body?_ Marie asked. _Oh, wow, that sounded so wrong. If it’s not immortality, then what is it?_

Sharley laughed. _I just wanna make you like Logan. It’ll be easier to show you than tell you, which I can’t do while you’re still on Earth. I know I just said how mentally tough you are, but I think losin’ you would break him. As it stands, you’ve got about sixty more years before your time is up, and while that might seem like a lot of time to you, it won’t to Logan. So we’re gonna fix that, and then you can go do your…human things._

Something in her tone suggested she was referring to certain specialized _things_ – though it also suggested total bafflement. Apparently there were a few things about humans she simply didn’t understand.

 _Trust me, I will_ , Marie said, trying not to laugh. _Could any of you maybe fix it so I can actually_ touch _people? ’Cause that’d make my life a lot easier._

 _Dunno_ , Sharley replied. _I couldn’t, but we’ll ask Jary. Not much she can’t do._

Marie hoped. Oh, she hoped. It wasn’t just that she wanted to be able to grope Logan without needing a barrier – it had been so very long since she could even hug someone without worry. She didn’t dare count on it, however.

She looked at Logan, who was dozing. She didn’t dare bring up Sharley’s ideas, either – if it didn’t work, she didn’t want to disappoint him, but if it _did_ work it would be the best kind of surprise. While she had her reservations about having her DNA – or whatever – messed with, if it worked, it would be worth it.

Everything would work. She had to tell herself that, or she’d lose her mind. Whatever needed to get done to her would get done, Kitty and Clarice would get anchored back, or whatever it was, and they’d all go rebuild the school. It would be fine, goddammit.

 _Of course it will,_ Sharley said. _Now take a goddamn nap. Clarice and Kitty are gonna need help when they wake up. I know the guys mean well, but…they’re guys. That Professor’s got his head on straight, but the rest of ’em? No offense, Marie, but Logan isn’t exactly Mister Warm and Fuzzy. Hank’s a genius, but his bedside manner sucks, and Erik is…Erik. He can help Kitty some ways, but you’ve known her a lot longer, and know her a lot better. Think of it as practice, for if you ever have kids._

 _Could_ she have children? It wasn’t exactly something Marie had given much thought to. Since she couldn’t touch anything living, she’d always assumed that would extend to a fetus. 

_Don’t rule out adoption,_ Sharley said, her tone almost scolding. _My mother’s not my biological mom. You’re gonna be livin’ in a school full of runaway kids in a few years._

That was true. Maybe by then she’d be interested in actually being a parent. She could actually safely do it now.

Her mind was quiet, and she thought that Sharley had subsided into the ether again. She watched Clarice, so very still, her heart monitor beeping steadily. 

_Don’t get too attached._

 

Marie twitched, and almost fell off her chair. It wasn’t Sharley’s words, it was her tone – the warning in it was very real. _What do you mean?_

_Here’s the thing that Logan probably hasn’t told you about – and that he might not tell you about, for fear of scarin’ you off. You’re gonna outlive everyone you know by a long, long time. If they have kids, you’ll outlive their kids, and probably their grandkids. Losin’ people you love doesn’t ever get any easier, no matter how long you have to do it._

_And not gettin’ attached will help?_ Marie asked, floored. Of course she’d known how old Logan was, which meant he’d left behind many people, but she’d never really thought about it before. He’d have her, now, but they’d still lose everyone else.

Sharley sighed. _No. It doesn’t help. I wish I could say it did. Is knowin’ that gonna put you off?_

Marie paused. It was a horrible thought, but then, Logan had already done it, God knew how many times. If he had, she could – and she’d have him. _No_ , she said. _No, it won’t_. 

She thought she could feel Sharley smile. _Good. Once other-me is done with Clarice and Kitty, we’ll see about gettin’ you there for real._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don’t think Sharley has any idea just how bad an idea it is, having both Kitty and Clarice trailing her. The Other isn’t quite ready for the two of them, but it’s even less prepared to get _all_ of them. Sharley will enjoy the hell out of it, even if the rest of that world won’t.


	42. Epic Win and Epic Fail

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Kitty and Clarice have a blast in the Other (which doesn’t enjoy it), Marie tries to win Logan over about taking a personal trip there (without telling him why), Sharley’s dad enters the equation, and paintballing happens. A lot.

The Other, Kitty decided, was the weirdest fucking place she’d ever seen. And that was really, really saying something.

It was obvious that it hadn’t always been like this. It wasn’t just the dying forest – they soon enough found a road, the asphalt heaved and buckled by time and possibly earthquakes. Like Old Echo, all of the Other had thrived at one point, and she wondered just what had changed that. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

The good thing about being here was that no matter how long she followed Sharley, she never did get out-of-breath or tired, and it didn’t seem that Clarice did, either. Probably the advantage of leaving their physical bodies behind – and oh, she hoped Erik wasn’t drawing on her face with a Sharpie or something. Did Sharpies even exist in 1973?

_Focus, Kitty_ , she ordered herself. While they might not be in any danger right now, she had the distinct impression that Memories probably weren’t the only deadly things running around in the Other.

Not that she asked. Sharley, when not explaining things, was a silent woman, and seemed content to remain that way. Kitty and Clarice more than made up for it, though they kept their voices down, instinct telling them that this was not a place where you wanted to attract attention to yourself. Unlike the ship, Kitty didn’t get a sense of other people anywhere near them, but still. She doubted a person could be too careful in here.

“Hey Sharley,” Clarice said, “are we going to keep on in this direction for a while?”

Sharley paused, and turned to look at her. “Yeah. Why?”

Clarice grinned. “I bet I can get us there faster,” she said, and threw a portal in front of them.

Sharley turned again, and stared. It took a moment, but she smiled, and reached out with one scarred hand to touch the portal’s edge. That smile transformed her – it didn’t just make her look younger, it made her look _alive_. There was a kind of wonder in it that Kitty would bet she didn’t often feel.

“This opens out ten miles from here,” she said, peering through the portal. “I wasn’t sure your mutation would even work in the Other.”

Clarice grinned. “I can go further than that,” she said. “It’s how I scouted our new locations, in the future.”

“I know,” Sharley said, looking at her with that odd, penetrating stare. “I am gonna have so much fun with you. Keep throwin’ those, kiddo.”

Clarice did as bidden, and Kitty tried not to trip over all the uneven obstacles they ran into – eventually she just halfway phased herself out, so she’d go right through anything the portal might inadvertently open into. Or onto. At one point they almost jumped out into a deep, arid crevasse that looked like someone had hacked at the ground with the world’s biggest axe. 

The last portal spat them out in front of something that looked like it had been yanked out of someone’s nightmares. It couldn’t rightly be called a castle – it looked almost like a natural formation in the shape of one, the curtain-wall a smooth, sheer length of unbroken black stone. Even the towers looked they were organic, rather than a conscious construction. It was weird, borderline-unnatural, and very, very…well, Other. It suited the place quite well.

“Let me guess,” Clarice said flatly, “this is where your dad lives.”

“He’s a hermit,” Sharley said. “He usually hates visitors. Not that that stops a boatload of us – sometimes literally – from droppin’ in just to annoy him.”

That didn’t sound like a healthy thing to do, at least if a person wanted to keep on living, but what did Kitty know? She’d been here less than a day, and that was including the time she’d been dead.

“Gotta warn you,” Sharley said, as they approached the wall, “he usually freaks mortal people out, but he won’t hurt you. He wouldn’t even if you came here on your own. He’s Death, but he doesn’t actually hunt people down or anythin’ – unless somethin’ extra weird is gonna happen to ’em. And he doesn’t ever kill anyone just for the hell of it – he’s not evil, no matter how scary he looks.”

Somehow, that was not as reassuring as Sharley no doubt meant it to be. Still, she was with them, and compared to him, both Kitty and Clarice were totally harmless. 

“Is there a gate somewhere?” Kitty asked.

“Nope,” Sharley said. “Clarice, you go on and portal us through, okay?”

Clarice, very nervously, did so. Passing through that portal was like nothing Kitty had ever felt: it was…sticky, in a way, as though the wall didn’t want to let them in even through such a doorway. Just what could anyone who lived in a place like this look like? She’d always thought of Death as the skeleton with the robe and scythe, but if Sharley actually was his kid, that wouldn’t exactly work from a biological standpoint. She’d said her mother was her foster-mother, but she’d given no evidence that her dad wasn’t her biological parent.

The ground beyond the wall was as smooth and featureless as the rest of the place, and just as black. The dull red light of the Other’s sun reflected off it like crimson sparks, but while the entire place was creepy as fuck, it didn’t seem _evil_. There was nothing actively malevolent about it.

There were also no people. Apparently Death was as much of a hermit as Sharley said he was, because it didn’t look like there were caretakers of any kind, though there also didn’t seem to be anything to take care of. Naturally, there was no lawn, no plants to be tended.

They approached a huge set of doors, easily four stories high, made of the same black stone – though these at least had an actual pattern to them, strange carvings that hurt Kitty’s eyes to look at. They opened with unnerving silence, and a lone figure stepped out.

He looked…well, he looked quite a bit like Sharley, with most of her features rendered masculine. His eyes were nothing like hers, though: they both matched, and were a disturbing red-orange. His dark hair had a reddish tinge to it, too, which made Kitty think Sharley’s blue hair was as unnatural as it looked. He had to be at least six-five, if not taller, and Kitty was damn glad Sharley had given them fair warning, because he was easily the scariest fucking thing Kitty had ever seen in her life – and that was including the Memories. _This_ was Sharley’s _father_? No wonder the woman was kind of insane.

“You can never simply visit me, can you?” he asked, eyeing Kitty and Clarice. “You always must bring strays. Very _strange_ strays,” he added, tilting his head a little as he regarded them, and Kitty knew where Sharley had inherited her laser-sharp stare. His was even worse. “These are not like the others.”

“Nope,” Sharley said, almost cheerfully. “Mutants, not magic. I need you to help me with ’em.”

He sighed. He actually _sighed_ , and weirdly, that more than anything made him seem like an actual parent. “Of course you do. Yet again, you bring me something that should not exist. Come here, both of you,” he said. “I will not hurt you.”

Kitty didn’t want to. She really, really didn’t, but she found her feet moving without bothering to consult her brain – and she froze when he reached out, hands hovering over their heads, almost but not quite touching their hair. He radiated cold like a freezer, and she tried not to shiver.

“I can fix this,” he said, after a small pause. “But you are right – I need Jary to do so. What are you going to do with them until then?”

“Well, they’ll wake up eventually, and go back to their actual bodies in their own world. Until then I thought I’d take ’em to New Echo. Been way too long since those smug bastards have had a real challenge, and they’re complacent. If somethin’ crossed the Edge now, they’d be screwed.”

“What is New Echo, and why do you want us to go there?” Clarice asked, sounding as dubious as Kitty felt.

“New Echo’s where all the survivors of the attack on Old Echo ran away to,” Sharley said. “They built a fortress in an old mall, and have lived there for four generations. Problem is that the Edge isn’t stationary, and it’s moved too close for ’em to think they’re as safe as they used to be. They’re set up great against all the standard shit the Other might throw at ’em, but there’s some things over the Edge that _I_ wouldn’t want to tangle with. You two are gonna go poke holes in their defenses.”

“But what if they kill us?” Kitty asked.

“If you’ve survived Sentinels so long, you can handle a few humans. Just portal around and run through some shit. Think of it as a vacation.”

Kitty and Clarice looked at one another. Who knew. Maybe this would be fun.

\--

Clarice didn’t look like she’d be waking up any time soon, and if Erik had half a brain in his head, he’d let Kitty sleep. Logan needed a cigar, so he and Marie ducked outside into the cool night air. “You were talkin’ to Sharley in your head, weren’t you?” he asked, the flame of his lighter bright in the darkness.

Marie didn’t seem at all surprised that he knew. “I was,” she said, “but I don’t wanna say what we were talkin’ about – not until I know if it’ll work or not.”

That was a little disturbing, but fair enough. She wouldn’t say that without her reasons.

She leaned against him, head on his shoulder. “D’you think things will ever go back to bein’ simple?” she asked. “Or, at least as close to simple as they used to be?”

He snorted. “Doubt it. I think ‘simple’ got shot in the face as soon as we all showed up back here.”

Marie rolled her eyes. “Of course you’d say that,” she muttered. “Sharley wants to take us to the Other.”

Logan almost choked on his cigar. “ _Why?_ ”

“Clarice and Kitty have to go, but she says we maybe oughtta go with ’em. _All_ of us. And I think I’d kina like to go.”

He looked down at her, wondering if she’d completely lost her mind. “How the hell can you say that, after what the Stranger showed us?”

“The Other’s not all like Echo,” she said. “And she’s been tellin’ me about her…relatives. I think I’d like to meet some of ’em. How many chances d’ you think we’ll ever have, to see a whole other world? On purpose, at least – knowin’ our luck, we might get dragged somewhere else totally against our will.”

Personally, Logan thought that was the most flat-out insane thing he’d ever heard in his life, but if Marie really wanted to go, he’d go with her. “I hope you know what you’re doin’,” he said.

Now it was Marie who snorted. “Of course I don’t,” she said. “But at least this time I don’t think that’ll bite us in the ass. Besides,” she added, “from what Sharley said, the Other won’t have a clue what to do with us. You can’t tell me you wouldn’t wanna raise a little hell while we have a chance.”

No, he really couldn’t. Marie knew him too well. “Fine,” he said. “But I’m toppin’ up your healin’ factor before we go. I can’t protect everyone, but I can protect _you_ , and I’m damn well gonna.”

“Of course you are, sugar. Sharley says there’s all kinda opportunities for us to have some fun while we’re there, too – says that other-her is probably lettin’ Kitty and Clarice have the time of their lives, and there’s plenty we can do, too, when we get there.”

“I don’t doubt it.” Logan couldn’t shake the feeling that this was actually a completely horrible idea, but if Marie wanted to do it, he didn’t see how he had much choice.

\--

Erik had been sitting still for so long that he was on the verge of nodding off himself. Kitty didn’t seem to be in any distress – she was just asleep, and very deeply so. He probably didn’t need to stay awake and worry, especially since Charles was there to keep an eye on things.

However, he hadn’t got past dozing when Kitty made a noise, shifting a little. She was…was she _giggling_? She _was_. He knew people talked in their sleep, but giggling? That was a new one.

“What is she doing?” he asked Charles, who looked as baffled as he felt. 

“I can’t get a proper lock on it,” Charles said, leaning forward and watching Kitty with a mix of interest and total confusion. “She’s – so far as I can tell, she and Clarice are running around in a shopping mall, terrorizing people with their mutations. And having a grand time doing so.”

Erik wished he could find that surprising, but he couldn’t. It was very…Kitty. “Are they in any danger?”

“I don’t think so. They’re – they’re testing something, although I don’t know what. The woman, Sharley, told them to run around and be as obnoxious as they could.”

“An order I’m certain she’ll regret,” Erik said dryly. He jumped a little when Clarice started giggling, too. He supposed he ought to be glad they were enjoying themselves, but there was something incredibly creepy about listening to someone laugh in their sleep. If he wasn’t quite certain Kitty would punch him in the chest for it, he’d wake her up now. As it was, he couldn’t grudge her a little entertainment, no matter how bizarre.

\--

Clarice hadn’t had this much fun in _years_. 

New Echo was, as Sharley had said, a mall – or at least, it had started as one. The central structure had been expanded upon, and fortified into a full-on…well, fortress. An entire building was a kind of artificial field/orchard combination, the climate carefully controlled to allow things to actually grow, but the rest of it, even the much newer portions, were still structured like a mall. It was as though the people living there had never seen nor heard of any other way to build, and had simply used the existing building as a template.

They’d been quite terrified to have Sharley and her father descend on them at the same time, until Sharley explained just what they were doing there. She’d then armed Kitty, Clarice, and all the guards with paintball guns – apparently kept for just such training exercises – and turned them loose, without bothering to warn any of the Echo citizens of just what the pair of them could do.

When Clarice threw her first portal, a good quarter of the assembled people screamed. They were, she noticed, the youngest – not that any of them looked particularly old. There appeared to be very few people over forty, which made her wonder just what the average human life expectancy was in the Other.

Not that it was her problem. She fired a few well-placed shots before hopping through the portal and snapping it shut behind her.

She’d landed on a skybridge, and paused a moment to take in just how bizarre her surroundings really were. What had once been stores had, for the most part, been given over to living quarters, though there appeared to be a few armories scattered among them. 

The walkways were also extremely crowded, and there was more screaming when she came hopping out of her portal. She didn’t bother shooting any of the civilians, since her gun only had so many rounds, but she splatted an approaching security guard right in the chest before portaling away again.

This one spat her out in what had once been the food court, now given over to actual food storage and a giant mess hall. Weirdly, there appeared to be a few actual restaurants scattered among them – but then, if New Echo was actually the city Sharley claimed it was, maybe that wasn’t so odd after all.

A paintball went whistling past her ear, and she crouched down, scanning the suddenly panicked crowd for the shooter. He was actually being smart – he’d taken cover behind what had once been a fountain, wall to his back, and he hefted his gun with actual professionalism. In an ordinary situation, he’d probably be fine – but this wasn’t ordinary, and Clarice suspected little in the Other ever was.

She portaled behind him and shot him in the back, a giant pink stain blooming over the black fabric of his jacket. He yelped, and she used his distraction to portal in front of him and grab his gun. _Now_ she could get away with shooting a few civilians, and she did just that, before hopping through another portal. It was good to know her time away from Sentinel-fighting hadn’t made her instincts rusty.

She landed on the far side of the mall, and took out the entire squadron guarding it before they even knew what she was doing. Both her guns were dry, so she stole three from her ‘victims’ and hopped onward.

Kitty went zipping by her next portal, giggling like a lunatic and carrying two guns herself. “I just got everybody in the east corner!” she called, before phasing through the wall of an appliance shop. Two guards skidded around the corner, evidently chasing her, and Clarice took them both out. Sharley was right – they really _were_ complacent. If two mutants could fell so many of them in so short a time, they really couldn’t handle anything other than a standard human attack, and somehow Clarice doubted those were very common here.

She hopped to what she was pretty sure was the north side, but threw a second so she could attack from above. Three more went down to her gun before the rest pulled their heads out of their asses long enough to realize that yes, the shots were coming from the ceiling.

One guard, a tiny redheaded woman, almost tagged her. If she hadn’t rolled away from the portal’s edge, she would have been hit full in the face; the paintball actually pulled at her hair. Okay, she’d have to give that one a commendation, whenever they were done – even if she did portal behind the poor woman and shoot her in the back. Clarice was impressed, but she wasn’t going to go easy on anyone just because their aim was good.

It wasn’t long at all before she and Kitty had taken out the entire city’s guarding force. They all trooped back to Sharley and her father, looking various shades of dejected, embarrassed, and really pissed off.

“See what I mean?” Sharley said. “You can’t count on your walls. These two coulda got in without you knowin’ a damn thing until it was too late. Even with me here to warn you, you got your asses handed to you. Just because the Edge won’t drag you over doesn’t mean it’s not getting’ closer every damn day.”

Looking at them all, it was all Clarice could do not to burst out laughing. The lot of them, even the biggest and toughest, looked like a group of chastised children. Fortunately, she managed to keep a straight face until she was outside, and then she and Kitty both dissolved into giggles again. 

“That,” Kitty said, hiccupping, “was the best thing I’ve done in ages. How are they all still alive, if they suck at defending themselves so much?”

“For several hundred years, the Edge was much further away,” Sharley’s father said. “The danger was not nearly so great.”

“There’s only so much reality to go around, in the Other,” Sharley explained. “The Edge is…well, the Edge. The things that live beyond it shouldn’t be real, but they _can_ be, out there. There used to be guardians, but they’ve moved on, so there’s nothin’ to stop it all breedin’ out there now. Isn’t often anythin’ crosses the Edge into the real Other, but when it does…well, New Echo’s damn lucky it hasn’t been wiped out long before.”

She shook her head, and looked at them both with an odd, almost maternal fondness. “I think it’s about time you woke up,” she said. “If you tell everyone how much fun you had, maybe it’ll make ’em less resistant to comin’ here, when the time comes.”

“We’ll try,” Clarice promised. 

\--

Charles, tired though he was, was hyper-vigilant in his watch of both Clarice and Kitty. He knew they were about to wake before they actually did it, and he wheeled himself over to Clarice’s bed. “Clarice?” he said, trying to stir her without scaring her.

When she opened her eyes, she looked at him for a moment before her gaze tracked to Kitty. They both burst out laughing, and immediately winced.

“I’m assuming you had fun,” Erik said dryly.

“We shot paintballs at a bunch of people who are too dumb to live,” Kitty said proudly. “And it was _awesome_.”

Erik turned that over for a second, and sighed. “Of course you did. You go to the nightmare-world responsible for the Memories, and you shoot people. What is paintball?”

Kitty blinked. “You mean it hasn’t been invented yet? Oh, this is going to be fun.”

“What about paintball?” Logan asked, stepping into the room with Marie beside him.

“We got to paintball a fortress in the Other, to prove just how much their security sucked,” Clarice said. 

“It was like dodging Sentinels, except, you know, without the possibility of dying,” Kitty added. “We took out their entire security force. There’s a lot of weird shit living in the Other, but evidently they don’t have mutants.”

“Lucky them,” Erik muttered.

Marie turned to Logan, and gave him a sly grin. “See? I told you it’d be fun there.”

“The question is,” Charles said, “were you tempted to stay? Was leaving difficult?”

Kitty and Clarice shook their heads in unison. “It was fun,” Kitty said, “but there wasn’t that feeling of _home_. Great place for a vacation, but I wouldn’t want to live there.”

Charles knew he wasn’t imagining the sheer enormity of Erik’s relief. However weird, creepy, and borderline- _wrong_ his and Kitty’s relationship – if one could call it that – was, the fact remained that they did care for one another, in some strange way. That knowledge did not, however, make them any less uncomfortable to watch – and he was quite sure they knew it.

“Can we go home?” Clarice asked, a little plaintively.

“I’m afraid they want to keep you overnight, for observation,” Hank said.

“We can stay, too,” Marie offered. “I mean, if you want some company.”

“I’d appreciate it,” Clarice said. “I don’t think I’m going to back to sleep again any time soon.”

“You know what we need to do?” Kitty asked. “What we really need to do? We need to design some paintball guns, because the fact that they don’t exist yet is absolutely fucking criminal. Am I right, or am I right?”

“You’re right,” Clarice said. “We need some pencils and a lot of paper.”

“This is going to be a very, very long night,” Erik sighed. Privately, Charles was inclined to agree with him – but their two charges were still alive. That made it worth it.

Especially since Kitty was lying. He’d been afraid Clarice was the one who the Other would sink its claws into, but Kitty was the one who actually wanted to go back. And that would not end well at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Uh-oh. They might all be tripping into the Other sooner than they anticipated. Introducing Erik and Logan to Sharley's father will certainly be...interesting. Marie and Sharley will probably want popcorn.


	43. Other

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which there is an emergency trip to the Other (which barely gets a taste of the chaos about to descend on it), and both worry and snark abound.

By the time dawn rolled around, Clarice had kicked everyone but Hank out. The Professor must have trusted her to not die if she fell asleep again, because he didn’t protest.

The trip home saw everyone but Logan nodding off, and even he was barely keeping his eyes open. Marie had fallen asleep against his shoulder while he was driving, and didn’t wake up even when he shifted gears. She drooled on him a little, too, and he was never going to tell anybody that he actually found that kind of adorable.

“C’mon, darlin’,” he said, when he’d shut the engine off. “Time to find a better place to nap.” Marie grunted, but didn’t move.

“Careful, Logan,” Kitty warned. “Poke her wrong and she’ll bite you. And not in the kinky way.”

“I don’t want to know how you know that,” Erik said. 

“I shared a room with her for five years,” Kitty said. “Jubilee and I would poke her with a stick when she didn’t want to get up. One time she bit the stick.”

“You have got to be joking,” Erik said, eyeing Marie over the back of the front seat. 

“I wish. It was creepy.”

“I was havin’ a nightmare,” Marie said, not opening her eyes. “I was bitin’ in self-defense.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not gonna lie – for a minute, Jubes and I thought you’d turned into a zombie.”

“I’d make the worst zombie ever,” Marie said, sitting up and cracking her neck. “I’d never get to eat anyone. They’d all be dead before I could even get a bite in.” She opened the door and halfway staggered as she stood, leaning against the car and yawning.

“That’s assuming you kept your mutation when you died,” Kitty said, trying to haul herself out of the car with much less success. Erik rolled his eyes, and helped her achieve something like balance. “God, wouldn’t it be horrible of the zombie apocalypse hit, and all of us still had our mutations? The world would be screwed.”

“What _is_ your fascination with zombies?” Erik grumbled. He followed her a little too closely as she walked, obviously ready to catch her if she should decide to fall on her face.

“ _Night of the Living Dead_ ,” she said. “Once you’ve seen it, you’ll understand. Logan, have VCR’s come out yet?”

“Beta’s not out until ’75,” he said. “VHS is in ’77. Can’t inflict Romero on him just yet.”

“Dammit,” she muttered. “Well, just take my word for it. Hey, Professor, what are we going to do about zombie Alfred? Do you want me to put back his heart?”

“Not until you’re physically and mentally ready,” the Professor said. “If it goes badly, he could die.”

“Wouldn’t that be a loss,” Logan snorted, ignoring the Professor’s disapproving glance. “Nobody drink that last beer in the fridge. It’s mine.”

“It’s seven in the morning,” Erik muttered.

“Well, I never said I wanted it _now_ ,” Logan retorted. “Go take a nap.”

“Gladly. Kitty, don’t die.”

“Wasn’t planning on it.”

Logan shook his head, leading Marie up to their room. He’d swear she was asleep before her head hit the pillow, hair fanned out around her on the pillow. 

Tired though he was himself, sleep was not to be found. A deep, horrible sense of impending dread hung over him – and the worst part was that his paranoia wasn’t unfounded.

Whatever happened, at least Marie was safe. She still had his healing factor – short of actual decapitation, she’d be okay. And if she did wind up losing her head, it would only be because he lost his own first.

So she wanted them to go to the Other. Huh. Of course he couldn’t help but wonder _why_ , but if she wasn’t ready to tell him, she had to have her reasons. She wasn’t the type to keep things from him – or anyone – just for shits and giggles. He had to admit he was curious about the place, especially after what Kitty and Clarice had evidently been doing there. Testing the defenses of a mall-turned-fortress with paintball guns didn’t jive with the Memories, but he hadn’t smelled a lie on either of the two. 

Well, that wasn’t quite true. Kitty had lied, when the Professor asked if she was at all tempted to stay in the Other, but Logan didn’t worry about it too much. They’d built enough of a home here that she had more reason to stay than to go – or at least, he hoped so. Because if she hadn’t, their lives were going to turn into one giant clusterfuck, and while that might be entertaining, it would probably be too much of a pain in the ass to make it worth it. Marie might want to go to the Other, but he’d rather not have to do it any time soon.

Of course, even by thinking as much, he was sorely tempting fate.

\--

Charles was quite grateful for the chance to take a very long nap. Mentally, he still hadn’t recovered from France, so he wasn’t able to give their newest problems the attention they deserved. He’d consult his elder self tonight, and see if they could handle this whole thing with their combined efforts.

He didn’t wake until early afternoon, and though his room was far too warm, he felt remarkably refreshed and cautiously optimistic. A call to the hospital assured him that Clarice was fine, and that Hank was being driven to distraction by trying to keep her sitting still. Once she was released and brought home, there would be far more people to keep her entertained and off her feet while she healed. To say nothing of all the kittens.

He wheeled himself to the kitchen and found Anathea and her crew had beaten him there, and had evidently decided that ice cream was a good idea for dinner. They seemed to be recovering from France well enough themselves, the lingering horror of it dulled by the myriad wonders this world continued to hold for them. Lia’s face was still bandaged, but her eye was intact, and most of them already had so many scars that he doubted she’d mind one more.

Charles himself needed something more substantial to eat, so he dug some sandwich fixings out of the refrigerator. He was joined soon enough by Logan, who came into the kitchen sans Marie, and who appeared to have the same idea in mind.

“She’s sleepin’,’ he said, when Charles asked. “Figured I’d slap somethin’ together meantime. Hope nobody drank that beer.”

On the surface, it really was odd how a man like Logan would so dote on someone. Had Charles not been able to read his mind, it still would have seemed strange, no matter how obviously he cared about Marie – at first glance, they were so very dissimilar. Each seemed to be everything the other wasn’t, but they shared loyalty and a truly inhuman stubbornness, and were more fiercely protective of each other than any pair Charles had ever seen in his life. He truly pitied anything that attempted to get in the way of that – though anything that stupid probably deserved what it got.

He’d almost finished his own sandwich when a sudden, searing pain tore through his head, so sharp and so deep that for a moment he thought it might split his mind. Terror not his own ripped at him, along with grief and almost unimaginable rage. It was almost enough to make him scream as he clutched his temples, the pain so intense he thought he might be sick.

Logan, still in the midst of making a second sandwich, looked at him with worry. “Professor? What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Charles managed, trying to breathe through the pain, “but I’m afraid we’re going to find out. Something – oh, _God_ …”

Something calm and warm closed over his mind, shielding it from whatever outside agony beat at it. It was, he realized, his elder self, who was obviously much better-equipped to deal with…whatever this was. _What happened?_ he asked, shuddering.

_I don’t know_ , elder Charles said. _It’s Erik – your Erik – I can’t even get a lock on his mind, but this is his doing._

That filled him with a deep and horrible dread. He’d hoped he’d been wrong, that spending all that time awake would have been enough… _I think I know. You’d best get here – everyone – before he catches someone alone and murders them just because he can._

“Get Marie,” he said to Logan. “She still has Sharley in her head, and I think we’re going to need both of them. Unless I’m very mistaken, we’ve just lost Kitty.”

Logan stared at him a moment, the full implications of that stinking in. “Oh, _fuck_ ,” he said. “I’ll be right back.” He took off – though he also took one of the sandwiches, no doubt to feed Marie even while he dragged her to the kitchen. 

“What – ?” Anathea asked, staring at him with wide, fearful eyes.

“Go outside,” he said. “All of you, and stay there. Take your ice cream if you have to, but don’t come back in until I tell you to.”

She looked poised to protest, but Lia grabbed her by the shoulder and all but marched her outside. Smart girl.

This was going to get ugly.

\--

Marie wasn’t quite sure how she wound up awake, walking, and eating within the space of fifteen seconds. One moment she was asleep; the next, Logan was leading her down the hallway even as he stuffed a sandwich into her hand. He was talking to her, but she was so disoriented that at first she could make neither heads nor tails of what he was actually saying.

_Your buddy Kitty just died_ , Sharley told her. _And Erik is…pissed. Get us down there and I’ll see if I can do a little damage control._

That was all Marie needed to hear. She took off down the hallway, leaving Logan having to run to catch up. “I thought the Professor said she’d be fine,” she protested, even as she went thundering down the stairs.

_Apparently not. Other-me shouldn’t have let her have so much fun in the Other, but that me hasn’t been around humans in a long time. Bein’ with you the last few days has been a bit of a re-education that she doesn’t have._

“Wonderful,” Marie muttered. “Can you get us there, to her? Can you open another door without destroying the mansion?”

_Have a little faith in me, Marie. This is gonna suck for you, but Jary can fix you up once we’re there. You’ve still got Logan’s healin’ factor, so you should be just fine._

Should be. Well, that was reassuring, in the sense that it absolutely wasn’t.

A deep, tearing screech of tortured metal split through the silence, and to her horror, she saw that one of the walls was actually buckling – the iron rebar twisted itself into odd, strangely terrible shapes, ripping its way out of the sheetrock and into the hallway. There was nothing conscious about it – whatever Erik was doing, he wasn’t doing it on purpose. She didn’t know if that was for the better, or worse. 

“Well, isn’t this fuckin’ brilliant,” Logan snarled, shoving her a little ahead of him and trying to keep himself between her and the writhing metal. “Goddamn can that man throw a temper tantrum.”

“That’s not fair,” Marie protested, even as she ducked. “If Kitty just – oh, _shit!_ ” She grabbed Logan’s collar and ducked, dragging him down with her as part of the ceiling cracked and crashed to the floor. “How the hell much metal is in this damn house?!” she demanded, trying to tamp down hysteria and barely succeeding. 

“More importantly, why the hell hasn’t Charles shut him down yet?” Logan grumbled, stomping right over the ruined flooring. 

No sooner had he spoken than everything ceased – silence fell, and nothing moved. Thank God for that, at least, but who knew just how hard a toll it was taking on the Professor, trying to cage the kind of fury and grief it would take to do all that shit in the first place.

Erik had beaten them to the kitchen, which he’d manage to smash halfway to hell before one of the Professors got a lockdown on him. Never in her life had Marie seen such an expression on a human face, and she hoped she never would again. It was pain, of course, as well as rage and grief, but there was something else to it, something that hurt so much to witness that she almost couldn’t look at him.

“You said she was _safe_ ,” he snarled at the Professor. “You said she didn’t want to go back. She wasn’t even asleep – she just _died._ ”

Marie looked past him, at the kitchen table, and almost screamed. Goddammit, he’d brought Kitty with him – Kitty’s corpse, anyway. Sure enough, her eyes were wide open, and their sightless stare almost froze Marie in her tracks.

“What the _fuck_ , Sharley?” she demanded, shoving her way through the kitchen. “How did she die if she was awake?”

_Dunno_ , Sharley said, with a grimness that did nothing at all for Marie’s nerves, _but we’re gonna find out._

“How?”

_You tell everyone as wants to go to get their asses in here_ , Sharley ordered. _We’re goin’ home._ My _home._

“What did she say?” Erik demanded, rounding on Marie. “That woman, that Sharley – what does she have to say for herself? She told you that if this happened, it was permanent – is it? _Is it?_ ”

“Watch it, bub,” Logan snapped, trying to grab Erik. “Marie ain’t Sharley. Don’t go takin’ this out on her.”

_Lemme handle this_ , Sharley said. _Let me take over, as much as I can._

_Gladly_ , Marie thought. Erik might be on their side, but she had zero desire to square off with him when he was like this. Oh, she could take him down if she had to, but only if she could actually touch him.

“We’re takin’ her to my foster-mother,” Sharley said, and oh, how weird it was, hearing her own voice transmuted through someone else. Sharley’s accent, while Southern, was not quite the same, and she seemed to automatically shift Marie’s voice down an octave, into something much more like her own. The difference, combined with the fact that Sharley’s bearing was nothing like Marie’s, threw Erik enough to stop him in his tracks. “I don’t know what the fuck happened here, but don’t let that worry you – I’d be more concerned if it actually made sense. The Other practically runs on sayin’ ‘what the fuck was that’?”

“Can she fix this?” The rage in his eyes was still there, but he’d been knocked off-balance enough that Marie was pretty sure he wouldn’t try to strangle her now. 

“Wrong question,” Sharley said. “It’s not a matter of ‘can’ so much as of ‘how’. Now calm your goddamn tits, grab everybody you want to bring with, and we’ll get goin’. Hey you, Professor – you’ve got your older self here, so grab him, too. If I’m gonna go draggin’ people to Jary, I might as well bring everyone she can fix.”

_Did you seriously just tell Magneto to calm his tits?_ Marie asked. In spite of everything, that was fucking hilarious.

_Of course I did. Can’t let him get on a real roll, or he’ll kill someone._

Marie would have laughed, except he looked at Kitty, and reached out to almost touch her hair, and then suddenly nothing was funny anymore. He didn’t have Sharley in his head, to bolster her reassurances with her actual voice, no phantom presence to give any kind of comfort. He was alone, and from what she’d gathered, Kitty had died right in front of him. That would be horrible even if he hadn’t already watched God knew how many people die.

“Hey,” Sharley said, “look at me. If she’s in the Other, she’s with Jary. We just need to bring her body with us.”

“And she’ll what,” Erik said, sounding far too broken, “just shove Kitty’s soul back into her body?”

“She’s done it before,” Sharley said. “Jary’s Life, with a capital L. Only thing she can’t bring back are zombies, and Kitty’s not a zombie. Now you pick her up, keep her close, and when we’ve got the other Charles down here, we’ll go. I know you don’t know me from Adam, but you need to trust me.”

He very obviously didn’t, and Marie at least knew that trying to get him to was a total lost cause. He did as asked, however, trying to shut Kitty’s eyes before he lifted her. It didn’t work, and Marie shuddered. She’d seen far too many bodies in the camps.

_It’ll work,_ Sharley assured her. Marie could only hope that she was right.

\--

Kitty wasn’t quite sure how she’d wound up on the ship again. One minute she’d been playing with kittens, and the next she was here, the arid heat of the Other settling on her like a heavy blanket. The sheer suddenness of it suggested that, somehow, for whatever damn reason, she’d probably just dropped dead back home.

Oops.

She knew that she probably ought to be concerned by that fact – that she at least ought to be something other than mildly confused. She was almost certainly _dead_ , and she was pretty sure she could care, but she just…didn’t. She couldn’t, because that sense of contentment, of _home_ , had her full in its grip again. Yes, it was hot and dry, but somehow that heat was a comfort rather than an irritation – it was as though she’d been too cold all her life, and only now did she feel properly warm. 

Though the ship was quite high in the air, there wasn’t the kind of wind she’d expect at such an altitude – just a faint breeze, enough to stir her hair and little more. It carried the Other’s distinctive metallic taste, but even that managed to be enjoyable. 

“Kid, I don’t know how you pulled that off, but you just gave me a massive headache.”

Kitty jumped, and turned to find that one of the others she’d sensed on the ship had actually found her. It was a woman, easily as tall as Sharley, her skin the color of a new penny and her long, tangled hair the color of a tarnished one. Her worn jeans and equally worn white tank top were stained with oil, as were her hands, and her expression, while exasperated, was also faintly amused. “How?”

“You’re making me deal with Sharley’s dad,” the woman said. “Which, yeah, this’ll be fucking hilarious, but still. I wasn’t counting on any of you showing up so soon.”

“You’re her foster-mother, aren’t you?” Kitty asked. She didn’t particularly like the thought of dealing with her father again – oh, he might not be a bad guy, but he looked like he _should_ be one. Then again, if Kitty was already dead, what more could he do? 

“Guilty,” the woman said. “She figured you’d turn up sooner or later, so she’s already on board, but Azarael’s an ornery bastard who’d probably rather rip his teeth out than spend too much time around my crew. He’s wandering around on the ground and scaring the shit out of everything he runs into.”

“Why?” Kitty asked.

“It’s the closest thing he has to a hobby, I think. C’mon – if you’re here, the others won’t be far behind, and I’d be real surprised if none of them were freaking out a little. We’ll pick that fucker up and get this show on the road, but first you need to see Sharley.”

Sharley, it seemed, thought the same, because she was approaching behind her foster-mother. The contrast between her and this woman, who was alive and then some, was almost horrible, because it made it all the more obvious that she was not actually a living creature herself. Her expression mirrored her foster-mother’s, though there was far more amusement in it, and even a trace of affection.

“You haven’t even been gone a _day_ ,” she said. “And I know you weren’t even asleep, so what the hell happened?”

Kitty shrugged. “I don’t know. If you wanted to make sure I didn’t want to come back here, you shouldn’t have let me have so much fun. Clarice might kick the bucket behind me, just for the chance to paintball someone again.”

Sharley actually rolled her eyes. “Well, the me in Marie’s head is about to drag half of you people here, too, so this’ll turn into a clusterfuck and a half real soon.”

“You can talk to that you?” Kitty said, surprised. So far as she knew, even the copy of the Professor Rogue had in her head couldn’t talk to the real thing.

“No, but I know me, and she _is_ me, so they’ll be hoppin’ on in here in, oh, about thirty seconds,” Sharley said. “Kinda interested to meet the rest of you.”

“Pretty sure it’s mutual,” Kitty muttered.

No sooner had she finished speaking than Rogue and Logan came staggering out of nowhere, joined by both Professors, Anathea and her entire crew, and Erik, who was – oh, God, he was carrying her dead body. Ew. 

“The hell was _that_?” Logan demanded, trying to right himself. His complexion was outright green, and he looked ready to fall over at any moment. “Felt like my skin just got turned inside out.”

“That happens sometimes,” Sharley said. “It’ll pass. Gimme that,” she added, facing Erik and holding out her arms. “I wanna know just what the fuck went wrong. This here’s Jary, and she’ll be fixin’ this shit for us today.”

Erik…God, he looked ready to either pass out or murder someone, and not necessarily in that order. But then, he would have seen her just keel over out of nowhere, and that had to have been a shock and a half. He didn’t look particularly thrilled by the idea of relinquishing her corpse, either, so she made her way over to him.

“Sorry, dude,” she said, wincing. “Give her my body so she can do her voodoo. Wow, that sounds wrong.”

He stared at her, and for a moment she thought he really _would_ pass out. She had no clue what to do, how to convince him that, while he was holding her corpse, she wasn’t really dead – or at least, she hoped she wasn’t. She certainly didn’t feel like a ghost, or a zombie.

“Come on,” she said. “I’m right here. That’s not actually me, so hand it over.” She touched his arm, thinking that maybe he needed actual physical evidence that she wasn’t just a hallucination.

“Oh, just pass her corpse over and give her a fuckin’ hug,” Rogue snapped, shaking her head, and promptly threw up. Logan, wincing, pulled her hair out of the way when she did it again.

Erik finally handed Kitty’s body to Sharley, and grabbed Kitty’s shoulders so hard that it probably would have hurt, if she’d been capable of pain in the Other. “You said you wouldn’t do that again,” he said, more harshly than he probably meant to. “You said you wouldn’t die.”

“Well, I didn’t exactly do it on _purpose,_ ” she protested, wondering if he was about to lose his mind. The look in his eyes was not one of a stable human being. “Sharley’s right – Jary can fix it, and we can go home.”

“ _Is_ that home to you?” he asked, and the odd, quasi-madness in his eyes ratcheted up a notch. “You died to come back here, Kitty. You were wide awake, and you died. How can you sit there and tell me that you don’t want to stay here – that you really, honestly would rather not be here, in the Other?”

“ _Because you’re not here, dipshit!_ ” she yelled, shoving him. “Well, I mean, you are right _now_ , but you don’t live here. Do you honestly think I’d ditch out on you forever?”

“I don’t know, would you?” he demanded, grabbing her shoulders again. “You’ve just done it. What’s to stop you doing it again?”

“I don’t know how to stop, uh, visiting, but I’m not going to stay here unless you do, too! God, you’re a moron!” She didn’t seem to be able to stop yelling, though she was sure it wasn’t doing any good.

“I sorta feel like we shouldn’t be watchin’ this,” Rogue said dubiously. She’d given up and sat on the deck, her face still horribly pale.

“Are you kiddin’ me?” Logan retorted. “This is better than daytime TV. Kinda want popcorn.”

Kitty glared at them. “Oh my God, will you both shut up? We’re trying to have a conversation here.”

“Oh, is that what you call it?” he snorted. “Could you keep the damn volume down? Some of us are tryin’ to keep our brains from leakin’ out our ears.”

“So go do it somewhere else. This ship is goddamn gigantic. I need to convince crazy man here that I’m not sticking around unless he – ”

She was only vaguely aware of Erik’s grumble of irritation, before he grabbed her face, turned it back to him, and kissed her.

So. There was that. Kitty’s brain promptly shut down, but not before she heard Rogue mutter, “Told you we shouldn’t be watchin’ that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, there’s an auspicious beginning to their vacation in the Other. Just wait until Sharley’s dad shows up.


	44. Surprises

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Marie has no idea how to convince Logan she’s serious about going through with Sharley’s plan, Azarael is all set up to troll the shit out of Erik and Logan (as soon as Jary lets him), Jary has some surprises to offer, and Erik and Kitty somehow manage to be both creepy and heartwarming.
> 
> Later update than usual, so I tried to make it nice and long to make up for it.

It had been a long, long time since Marie had felt quite _this_ awkward. She supposed she ought to be happy for that pair of lunatics, and in a way she was, but some things were better kept _private_ , goddammit. You didn’t see her and Logan making out in public. Granted, they couldn’t properly make out, but still. She forgot where she’d been going with that, and wasn’t sure she wanted to remember.

She glanced at Logan, who looked every bit as uncomfortable as she felt, and it was all she could do not to burst out laughing. “What do you say we give them a little, um, space?” she suggested, hoping like hell that she was done being sick. Sharley hadn’t been kidding when she said this was going to suck – it felt a lot like someone had stabbed a jolt of static directly into Marie’s brain, and let it squirrel-cage around for a bit.

“Darlin’, I think that’s the best idea you’ve ever had,” he said fervently, standing and helping her to her feet. “That’s gonna haunt might nightmares.”

“There’s plenty of other shit in here to have nightmares about,” Sharley said. “C’mere, Marie, and let Jary have a look at you. If other-me used you to open a way in here, you probably feel even worse than you look.”

“Thanks,” Marie muttered, swallowing hard in an attempt to force back burning bile. “She did warn me it wouldn’t be any fun.” She looked at Jary, a woman who didn’t appear nearly old enough to be any kind of parent to Sharley; they might easily have been the same age. There was something strangely _warm_ about her, as though she radiated sunlight rather than the Other’s harsh heat.

Jary looked from her to Logan, and back again. “She wasn’t kidding. If you didn’t have his healing factor, it would have killed you. Bet she didn’t mention that.”

“No,” Marie said, badly startled, “she didn’t.”

 _You didn’t ask_ , the Sharley in her head said. _I knew you could do it_.

Somehow, that was not reassuring. “Anythin’ else you didn’t tell me?” Marie asked aloud.

 _Nope, that was it_.

“Great. You’re kinda crazy, you know that?”

Jary snorted, choking on her own laughter. “Kid, you’ve got no idea. She used to be a lot worse.”

“Thanks,” Sharley said dryly, but a hint of a smile hovered around her mouth. “All right, listen, all of you – yeah, even you two bein’ disgustingly human over there. We’re gonna pick my father up, and I’d better warn you that he’s an asshole.”

“He also, when he feels like it, has a damn vindictive sense of humor,” Jary added. “He won’t hurt you, but if you piss him off, he’ll make you pay somehow.”

 _That_ filled Marie with a dread that managed to tamp down her lingering nausea. Not because she was afraid of what he would do, but of what _Logan_ would do – knowing him, he’d take that as a challenge.

“Sugar, no,” she said, as sternly as she could. “I do not wanna have to worry about you the whole time we’re here.”

“I’ll behave,” he said, in a tone that indicated quite clearly he had no intention of behaving at all.

“Oh, let him,” Jary said. “Some people just have to learn the hard way. Now take off that glove, kid, and let me see what I can do for you.” She held out a hand, but Marie hesitated. Oh, she knew she probably couldn’t hurt Jary at all, but old habits died hard.

“Okay,” she said, after a slightly awkward pause as she pulled the glove off her right hand, “but this might sting.”

“Kid, I had a nuke dropped on me once. Trust me, nothing you could do to me would sting.” She took Marie’s hand in both of hers, her touch careful, as though she knew just how fragile human beings actually were. Her fingers were very long, and calloused in a way that spoke of much actual work on her ship. 

Sharley’s touch had been a horrible thing, filling Marie with such visceral aversion that she’d been afraid she’d be sick. Jary’s was just as alien, but very much the opposite of Sharley’s – never in her life had she known something so comforting, not even when her mother had soothed her as a child. Her nausea vanished like smoke, and her weary soreness went with it, leaving her feeling calmer and more refreshed than she perhaps had ever felt in her life.

“I’m gonna be blunt with you,” Jary said. “I don’t know if I can fix it so you can actually touch people. Giving you what Logan has will only work if you can hold onto his mutation, which you couldn’t do if I turned yours off and made you touchable. If what you had was magic, I could probably do whatever the hell I wanted, but mutation’s a trickier thing, and not one I’ve seen in a very long time.”

Logan did a slight double- take. “Wait, what? What about givin’ her what I have?”

“That’s what I wanted to wait to tell you, sugar,” Marie said, fairly basking in the warmth of Jary’s hands. It had been so long, so very, very long, since she could hold someone’s hand, and Jary was possibly the most maternal creature she’d ever seen, no matter how much didn’t look like one at first glance. “Sharley thinks Jary and her dad can make your mutation stick – make it so you don’t have to keep dosin’ me with it, and I’ll age like you do.”

Logan stared at her, his expression so floored that it was all Marie could do not to laugh. Jary didn’t bother trying to hold back, and absolutely cackled.

“You didn’t tell him?” she asked, finally letting go of Marie’s hand.

“I wanted to wait until I knew if you could do anythin’,” Marie defended, fighting an urge to wave her hand in front of Logan’s face. He looked like his brain had temporarily switched off.

“Speechless Logan,” Kitty said. She had, thankfully, left off with the kissing (which would probably give Marie the heebie-jeebies for the next decade), though she looked more than a little blitzed. “Never thought I’d see that happen.”

“It’s unfortunate we don’t have a camera,” Erik added. He was less than a hairs-breadth behind Kitty, one hand on her shoulder, and he looked so insufferably smug that Marie wanted to hit him on sheer principle. 

“Fuck off,” Logan said automatically. Apparently Erik’s sarcasm was enough to draw him out of his shock, deep though it had evidently been. “You can _do_ that?” he asked Jary.

“I can try. Like I said, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen mutants or anything like you. It’s not something I can just snap my fingers for – you’re going to be here for a while, so if there’s anyone else you want to drag over, we might as well do it now.”

“Clarice will want to come,” Kitty said. “Hank would find this totally fascinating, and Raven wouldn’t want to let him come alone. We probably ought to just get everybody – even Zombie Alfred and the kittens.”

Jary gave her a questioning look, and Erik sighed.

“It’s a long story,” he said. 

“I bet it is,” she snorted. “Stay put while we go get Az. Sharley’ll show you around in a bit.” She left them to it, crossing the massive deck, humming a little to herself.

Marie looked at Logan, who smelled as stunned as he still looked. “You okay?” she asked.

“I – are you sure you wanna do this, Marie?” he asked. “Sometimes I think my mutation’s a curse, makin’ me outlive everybody I know.”

“That’s _why_ I wanna do it,” she said. “Otherwise you’d outlive me by God knows how long, and I can’t do that to you. And I’d only wanna live so long if I had you to live with.”

“I think I might be sick,” Erik muttered, and grunted when Kitty elbowed him in the chest.

“Shut up,” she said. “They’re sweet. And they could probably do with some privacy, so let’s go freak someone else out.” She grabbed his hand and practically dragged him off, and it Marie barely managed to stifle her laughter. It was already fairly obvious who the boss was in that relationship.

“Darlin’,” Logan said, rubbing the back of his neck. He looked equal parts hopeful and deeply uncomfortable, “d’you even know what that really means? We wouldn’t just be watchin’ all of them die – it would be everyone we meet, over and over, for God knows how long. Christ, Marie, I fought in the Civil War, and physically I’m still nowhere near old. Who knows how much longer I’ll live, and you wanna do that to yourself, too?”

She pulled her glove back on, and took his hand. “Sharley’s told me some,” she said. “I’m not goin’ into this completely blind. She warned me just what this’d really mean.”

He looked at Sharley, who had backed off a ways. There was no way he could trust her like Marie did, because he didn’t _know_ her like she did. And yeah, on the surface she didn’t exactly look like somebody all that trustworthy, but Marie had learned enough about her to believe that they could.

“Look at me, sugar,” she said. “I know what I’m doin’. She told me that losin’ people never gets any easier, no matter how many times you do it, but I’ll have you, and you’ll have me. Neither of us will have to watch the other get old and die, and know that we won’t be able to follow where the other goes.”

He still looked troubled, and she had a feeling he wouldn’t be easily convinced. Fortunately, they had time.

\--

Charles, quite frankly, had no idea what to make of any of this. It would seem his elder self didn’t, either, but at least that Charles was facing this with much more equanimity – if no less curiosity.

He thought he could understand a little of the allure it held for Kitty and Clarice. No, he didn’t feel the strange sense of _home_ they’d described, but this place was fascinatingly alien, as were its people. He wasn’t quite sure what to make of them, because, to his immense surprise, he could read neither Sharley’s nor Jary’s minds.

He probably shouldn’t be surprised, though. He had no idea what they really were, and if what he had inferred was correct, Sharley wasn’t even _alive_ in any traditionally-understood sense of the word. Given what he understood about the nature of Marie’s mutation, it was no shock that the two seemed far more familiar than he would have expected, but he wouldn’t read Marie’s mind to discover anything more. Not yet.

The woman was approaching now, leaving Marie and Logan to talk, still holding Kitty’s corpse. Her eyes flicked from him to his elder self, and she smiled a little, faint and fleeting and bittersweet. “I’ve only known two telepaths in my life,” she said. “One was the biggest asshole I’ve ever met – and believe me, that’s really sayin’ something – but the other was the best friend I’ve ever had. You’re both welcome here – you’re all welcome. So long as you’re on Jary’s ship, you’re safe. Not much in the Other dares fuck with her, and the things that do always lose.”

Her strange eyes roved over them all – that was where the odd sheen in Marie’s had come from, surely. Anathea and her group looked torn between fascination and utter terror, huddled in a tight knot. On his elder self’s other side, the older Erik looked more uncomfortable than anyone Charles had ever seen in his life – but then, he’d just witnessed his younger self kiss somebody he’d probably seen as a child. That would give anyone the creeps. It certainly disturbed Charles, so much so that even the thought of it made him twitch.

Sharley looked at him and arched an eyebrow, and he wondered if she was some kind of telepath herself. Her small, not-quite-smile certainly suggested she knew what he was thinking.

“Really safe?” Anathea asked, clearly not buying it at all.

“Really,” Sharley assured her. “You hungry? I can get one of the crew to show you down to the canteen.”

Anathea shook her head. “Not yet,” she said, and Charles didn’t need to read her mind to know what that meant: she didn’t want them to get separated from the main group just yet. Not that he could blame her, given that they still hadn’t even got used to Earth in 1973 – this place had to seem even weirder to them than it did to him. If that was possible.

“I didn’t think you would be bringing me even _more_ strays, Sharley.” 

He looked away from the little group, searching for the speaker, and saw a man approaching across the wide expanse of the deck. Very pale, and very, very tall, he had to be Sharley’s father, and Charles could see well why she had warned them about him beforehand. She and Jary both had a careless aura of power about them, but there was nothing careless nor subtle about her father’s. He wore it like a mantle, a cloak of intangible ice that actually seemed to leech some of the heat from the air.

Sharley rolled her eyes, shifting her hold on Kitty’s body. “I didn’t just bring them to _you_ ,” she said. “Besides, this one came on her own. Sort of. I’m not sure why she just dropped dead, and neither is she.”

“Of course not,” he said, and he actually sounded faintly exasperated. His eyes – such a strange color, a red-orange that glowed like embers – swept both Charleses. “Telepaths,” he said flatly, and there was nothing to be read in his tone: it wasn’t approval, but it wasn’t outright disapproval, either.

“They’re not like _him_ ,” she assured him. “They’re mutants, and I think they’re a bit like Lorna, minus the harmless insanity. Guys, this is my father Azarael,” she said. “Otherwise known as Death, but like I said, he won’t hurt you.”

“Do not leave the ship and die,” he said, his voice slightly pained. “My daughter is creating far too much work for me as it is. I do not fully understand what it is you would have me do,” he added, looking back at Sharley. “I do not make life, as you well know.”

“You made _me_ ,” she retorted. “And you don’t need to make shit right now – just work with Jary. She can jam Kitty’s soul back into her corpse, and you can help with Marie. Marie, c’mere,” she called. “This is my dad. He’ll be helpin’ Jary.”

Marie paled, eyes widening until they were round as silver dollars. Behind her, Logan went very, very still, and Charles could almost feel his hackles rise. 

“I will be _attempting_ to help Jary,” Azarael clarified. “My daughter has an unfortunate tendency to volunteer me for things that may or may not be beyond my ability.”

“He’s full of shit,” Sharley said. “If he actually wants to do somethin’, he can do it. He just doesn’t often want to.”

“…Right,” Marie said, the word little more than a breath. “Um. Hi. Logan, say hello.”

Logan, predictably, said nothing. He had, Charles suspected, dropped into feral-mode, his animalistic instincts taking the fore. He might be a predator, but he was faced with the biggest predator there was, and his instincts didn’t know what to do about that. A skim of his mind confirmed that – flight was not in his nature, but fighting Death would be insane. 

_Wake up, Logan_ , Charles said. _He is no threat to you or Marie. You are more than an animal._

Logan actually twitched as he came back to himself. “Hi,” he said, very belatedly. 

Charles would swear that gruff, awkward greeting amused Azarael – not that Charles would dare try to read his mind. He might look every bit as terrifying as Death should, but he was far from a machine. There was a sense of humor in his hellish eyes.

Kitty, who had far too much energy for someone who was technically dead, came bounding across the deck, dragging Erik with her. Though he looked faintly annoyed, there was a smugness about him that was deeply, _deeply_ disconcerting – at least, until he saw Azarael. As soon as Erik clapped eyes on him, he halted, which jerked Kitty to a sharp stop.

“Dude,” she said, glaring at him a little. “This is Sharley’s father. He went with Clarice and I when we shot up the security force with paintballs.”

Sharley choked, very quietly, and Charles watched her fight a smile and lose. She was watching the introduction with very well-concealed glee – her face might as well have been a mask, but her eyes were positively dancing with repressed laughter.

Azarael eyed Erik very closely, assessing him with a razor-sharp gaze, and Charles wondered what he saw. Certainly Erik had killed many people, but Logan probably had, too, and he wasn’t getting the microscopic inspection.

The somewhat surprising thing was that Erik was actually meeting Azarael’s eyes, though he was pale, and his expression was rather strained.

“You are a strange one,” Azarael pronounced at last. “Even for a mortal.” He was still eyeing Erik very closely, an odd sort of curiosity in his expression. It made Charles very nervous, and he could tell it unsettled the hell out of Erik, too, try though he did to hide it.

Kitty snickered. “You have no idea,” she said. “Any idea how I just randomly died and showed up here? I knew there was a chance I’d do it in my sleep, but I was wide awake. And Erik, if you say ‘that’s what she said’, I’ll kick you.”

He said nothing, though the words were obviously on the tip of his tongue. He still hadn’t looked awake from Azarael, and Charles thought that at this point, it was probably a matter of sheer stubbornness. 

One corner of Azarael’s mouth twitched. “No,” he said, “I do not know yet. For that, I will need a closer look at your body.”

Kitty choked back a laugh, but before she could speak, Erik laid his free hand on her shoulder. “If I can’t say it, neither can you,” he said. He looked rather more disturbed than she did, but that was possibly only because she was barely managing not to crack up entirely. How she could be so amused around a creature like Azarael, Charles didn’t know, but he rather envied it.

Jary meandered over to them, leaving Marie and Logan plenty of space to talk. She looked at Azarael and Erik for a moment before she went to Sharley, rolling her eyes as she did so.

“So,” she said, her gaze transferring to both Charleses. “You two. Haven’t seen two people from the same timestream together in a long while. How’d you get paralyzed?”

“Bullet to the spine,” he said. While Azarael radiated cold, she gave off a warmth quite different from that of the Other, and it was all he could do not to bask in it. “For a while I took a drug that allowed me to walk, but it interfered with my abilities.”

Her eyes flicked from him to his elder self, and she smiled. “ _That_ I can fix with no problem, but we’d best get you to the infirmary. Sharley, bring that corpse with you and follow me, and Kitty, you c’mon too. Az, I don’t want you running around on my ship unsupervised, so you come, too.”

“What exactly do you think I would do to your precious ship, if left unattended?” he asked dryly.

“I don’t know, and I don’t want to find out. I don’t go stomping around that creepy castle of yours by myself, and I don’t want you wandering my ship without me keeping an eye on you. You creep the crew out enough as it is.”

What sort of crew would a ship like this have? Thus far they’d seen no evidence of one. Strange, that Charles’s mind would focus on that, rather than the unexpected, mind-blowing possibility of having his spine fixed. It had never occurred to him that that could be done here, despite the fact that Jary could, at least in theory, resurrect Kitty. His elder self didn’t look quite so surprised, but at this point, Charles doubted there was much at all that _could_ surprise him. 

He followed after Sharley, his brain still incapable of processing the enormity of what Jary proposed. He’d given up all hope of walking after he stopped taking Hank’s drug, and having it so suddenly kindled again was almost more than he could handle.

\--

Had it not been for Jary’s interference, Erik wasn’t sure he could have broken off his staring contest with Azarael.

He didn’t know where it had come from, or why his instincts were so insistent that he do it, but he didn’t dare look away, even for a moment. He sensed no actual hostility from the man – creature – whatever he was, but the fact remained that Azarael was _Death_. Erik wasn’t used to running up against anything that could kill him in a heartbeat: even the Memories hadn’t hit him with this sort of visceral aversion. 

Perhaps it was because Kitty was technically dead. Oh, she seemed alive enough – her hand was warm in his, and very solid, so unlike either ghost or zombie – but the fact remained that Sharley was carrying her corpse. If her soul couldn’t be replaced, he was quite sure she would never be able to leave the Other, which meant he wouldn’t, either. He didn’t relish the idea of living out the rest of his days in this hellhole of a world, but if she stayed, he did too. It was an idea he ought to resign himself to, but he couldn’t. Not yet. 

Jary led them all through a huge wooden door smoothed and polished with age. It opened into a short hallway, surprisingly wide, lit with brass lamps that could have been lifted directly out of the Victorian era. Despite their age, they contained electric bulbs, and he wondered how anyone could have wired such an old-fashioned ship. Then again, the damn thing was _airborne_ – wiring was not the thing he needed to wonder about.

It smelled oddly sweet, the scent of fresh lumber permeating the entire hallway despite the obvious age of the ship. There was another scent beneath it, some form of incense he couldn’t have hoped to name, along with the sharpness of machine oil. He could only imagine how intense it must be for Logan – and for Marie too, at the moment. At least it wasn’t unpleasant.

When they reached a long flight of stairs, Sharley turned to him. “Can you and older you help with the wheelchairs? Ship isn’t exactly built with handicap access.”

It wouldn’t need to be, would it? If Jary could simply heal any injuries her crew might sustain, such concessions would hardly be necessary.

Erik looked at Charles as he carefully lowered the wheelchair to the hallway below. His friend – and Erik did still consider Charles his friend, no matter what Charles thought – was quite understandably pensive to the point of shock, moving his chair on auto-pilot. His elder self, unsurprisingly, seemed much calmer; Erik wondered if anything could disturb his serenity. Even the Memories didn’t seem to have done so.

The corridor was even wider down here, and they found the first indications of crew: three children went barreling toward them, automatically flattening themselves against the wall as they scooted past. All were barefoot, and dressed in a curious hodgepodge of clothing from all over the twentieth century.

“Your crew keeps their kids on board?” Marie asked. She and Logan had taken up the end of the line, so she had to raise her voice.

“They _are_ the crew,” Jary said. “Other makes a lot of orphans. I take them on my ship and train them, and when they grow up, they get ships of their own. We keep the sky as clear as we can, and if shit happens to one of the settlements on the ground, we evacuate it – if one of us is close enough to get there in time. Lot of times, we aren’t.”

Erik wasn’t going to ask what she meant by ‘keep the skies clear’. He really, really didn’t want to know.”Your entire crew is made up of children? You have no adults at all?” How on Earth could children run such a ship? He had no idea just how big the thing really was, but even from what little he’d seen, it had to be enormous. But then, perhaps ‘Earth’ was the operative word – this _wasn’t_ Earth, or anything like it.

“Don’t need them. The older ones train the youngest. I’ve found kids learn the ropes better – literally – when they don’t have an adult breathing down their neck, giving them a false sense of security. A kid that doesn’t learn to fend for themselves in the Other doesn’t last long, and from what I’ve seen of adult humans, they cram kids into a box labeled ‘Child’ and use it as an excuse to treat them like glass. Doing that in the Other’s a good way to wind up with a dead kid.”

Erik wondered just what either Charles felt about that, since both had once run a school. Neither would say anything, he was sure.

The hallways in this place were like a maze – they took so many twists and corners that he couldn’t hope to find his way back to the deck by himself, and he doubted any of the others could, either. They passed more of the child-crew, all of whom squeezed their way past like snakes, though their bare feet thundered over the floor when they were through. They all spared the group a curious glance, but nothing more, and he wondered just how often the ship was visited by strangers.

“Here we are,” Jary said. “Go on in.”

The ship might seem largely archaic, but its infirmary was as modern as any hospital room, though rather less sterile and impersonal. It had rows of beds, as well as an exam table, and a granite countertop with a long line of sinks. The floor was tile rather than wood – likely much easier to clean, if things ever got bloody – and all the beds appeared to be bolted to it. It made him suspect that sailing the air was not always this smooth.

He tried not to be obvious as he hustled Kitty away from Azarael – and tried to convince himself that it was for her sake, rather than his. Neither worked very well, to Azarael’s obvious – if restrained – amusement. He certainly seemed to have that in common with his daughter, and it grated on Erik’s nerves like sandpaper. He was not at all used to feeling so inferior, and to say he didn’t like it would be a vast understatement.

Kitty turned and looked up at him, frowning. “Okay, the overprotective shtick? It might work with Marie and Logan, but it doesn’t fly with me. I _can_ look after myself, you know.”

Erik arched an eyebrow, and looked at her corpse in Sharley’s arms. “Clearly,” he said, dry as burnt toast.

She winced. “Okay, good point, but still. You don’t need to keep dragging me away from Azarael like he’s a rattlesnake. It’s not necessary, and it’s starting to piss me off. For fuck’s sake, Erik, I’m _already dead._ ”

He shut his eyes. “I know,” he said, sounding more strained than he intended. “That’s the problem. We’re being followed by Death, and Sharley’s holding your corpse. He could very easily make certain you never reunite with it.”

Kitty poked his arm, and he opened his eyes. “Yeah, but he won’t,” she said, her irritation evaporating. “For one thing, even if he wanted to – and he has no reason to want to – Sharley wouldn’t let him, and neither would Jary. I know you’ve seen a lot of people die, Erik, but he didn’t take them from you. If Earth even has a Death, it’s not him.”

Logically, he knew that. Unfortunately, logic was of no help in this situation. He had no way of actually communicating that, though – however eloquent he might be about most things, actually talking about anything related to emotions was more difficult than pulling teeth. There were a lot of things he’d like to say, but he was constitutionally incapable of actually giving voice to any of them.

Kitty, it seemed, understood. She gave him a small, slightly crooked half-smile, and wrapped her arms around him. “Chill,” she said. “I’m not going anywhere. Unless I have to pee, but I don’t think you need to do that when you’re dead.”

He laughed before he could help himself, and pulled her closer, resting his chin on the top of her head. If he touched her, it reminded him that she was real – that she wasn’t some delusion called up by a mind broken by grief. And it had the very nice side-benefit of making everyone they’d come here with monstrously uncomfortable – the Charleses tried to hide it, but Logan sure as hell didn’t. He looked like the only thing keeping him from running away was Marie, who herself was studiously looking at the wall. Kitty’s embrace might be reassuring, but the others’ discomfort cheered him up immensely.

“Okay,” Jary said, looking from one Charles to the other, “who’s first?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The joy of dealing with Life is that she can rebuild things. She might not have the technology, but she does have the power, fortunately for both Charles’s.


	45. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, it’s been ages since I updated, but the holidays and real life have both conspired against me. I have a little downtime for the next week, so hopefully I can update a little more regularly for a while. In which the Other hits them all, and they hit back.

Charles the Elder went first, mostly to allay the worries of his younger self. While he could not read Jary’s mind, he’d spent many years honing the ability to read someone’s trustworthiness on short notice. Sheer survival had demanded it.

The elder Erik, far more cynical, stayed with him – though what he thought he could do, Charles wasn’t sure. There was no sense in attacking a creature like Jary, who could probably crush them all like insects without so much as blinking.

“All right,” she said, helping him onto the exam table. “This won’t hurt, but it won’t feel great, either. Your legs’ll be weak at first, but there’s plenty of space to roam around and strengthen them.”

“How does it work?” he asked, even as she took his hand. Her fingers were surprisingly, inhumanly warm, and they radiated comfort like nothing he had ever known.

“Probably can’t get away with saying it’s just magic, huh?” she asked, giving him a slightly crooked smile. “Your severed nerves are effectively dead. All I need to do is reconnect them to everything above the paralyzing wound and you’re good to go.”

“And you can do that just through touch?” It was a fascinating thought, and not something he would have ever considered possible. There were mutants like Logan, who could heal themselves, but Charles had never encountered anyone who could heal others.

“Yep. There’s not a lot I can’t heal, but your three friends with the Memory-wounds I can’t do much for. Those are scars that even transcend death,” she said, nodding at Sharley. “It’s lucky your girl over there didn’t lose her eye, because I couldn’t fix that. I’m amazed any of you survived at all.”

“The Memories in the basement were fuckin’ stupid,” Marie said, but the inflection in her voice was more like Sharley’s – apparently the Sharley-in-her-head had reared up. “Fortunately for everyone involved. Must’ve been an artifact of how they were made. I kinda want to see what happened when they met their cousins over here, because it probably didn’t end well for ’em.”

That was a somewhat appalling thought. The things they had faced in France were bad enough – the idea that there were even worse things in the Other was not a comforting one.

“This is a harsh world,” Jary said, and he wondered if she’d read his mind. “There’s some shit over the Edge that makes the Memories look like cuddly bunnies, but it mostly _stays_ over the Edge. Now hold still and try to stay calm.”

Staying calm was not much of a problem. That ability too had been honed by years of practice, but he nevertheless couldn’t help a small amount of anticipation. Even now, after so much horror, his curiosity remained undimmed.

Jary didn’t say anything, or even do anything beyond holding his hand in both of hers. The odd warmth of her touch traveled down his arm, spreading through his nerves like sunlight – and reaching down through his legs. _That_ burned, but it wasn’t painful – just slightly uncomfortable, and impossible to ignore. It had been so very long since he’d been able to feel his toes, and he flexed his feet within his boots simply because he could. It grew and strengthened, amplifying itself as it reverberated back up toward his neck: she was right, it wasn’t precisely pleasant, but neither was it horrible. It was…alien, far more so than anything he’d yet encountered here.

She gave him another grin when she released his hand. “Okay,” she said. “Up you get.”

Despite the sensation in his legs, he was hesitant to do so. It had been so very long since he’d been able to use them, and some part of him was afraid that he’d forgot how, nerves or no nerves.

“It’s okay,” she said. “You’ll be fine. Trust me.”

He’d trusted her this far, hadn’t he? Even sitting up was strange, now that he could actually feel his legs, and swinging them down to the floor was stranger still. Balance was not something immediately remembered, and he wobbled precariously for a moment, leaning heavily on the edge of the exam table. She hadn’t been kidding when she said his legs were weak; he felt like his atrophied muscles might give out at any moment, but he was _walking_. He might have to lean on the table with each step he took, but he could actually take steps.

“I’ll get you a cane,” Jary said. “You’ll probably want one for a bit. Deck’s plenty big for you to get some exercise, and the crew’ll look after you. Have some fun.”

\--

For some reason, Logan couldn’t bring himself to watch Jary work on the elder Professor. Since he _certainly_ didn’t want to be anywhere near Erik and Kitty, he’d wandered much closer to the door, idly inspecting the rows of beds.

Marie, no doubt sensing he needed space, had stayed with the younger Charles, avidly curious as to what Jary was doing. It meant she wasn’t near enough to keep Sharley from zeroing in on Logan.

He really had no idea what to make of the woman. Jary smelled like sunlight, a warm summer day, but Sharley smelled like lightning, sharp and hot and metallic. Jary practically exuded comfort, but Sharley emanated a strange sort of grief. And unlike Jary, she had no pulse, nor did she breathe unless she spoke. It was creepy.

“You don’t need to worry about Marie,” she said, standing beside him but not looking at him. “Be glad you have her – be glad you’ve got someone who _can_ stay with you, instead of just _wantin’_ to.”

“Lost people?” he asked, though he didn’t think he needed to.

“Over and over,” she sighed. “And I’ve told Marie what that’s like. I warned her that she’d be watchin’ all your friends, and their kids, and _their_ kids die. I didn’t railroad her into this, Logan. She loves you in a way that’s damn rare, and I don’t wanna see you throwin’ that over because you’re afraid she’ll come to hate you in a century.”

He twitched, startled, and now she looked at him. “I might not be human, Logan, but I was once,” she said. “I know how you all think. And if you think she could ever hate you, you don’t really know her at all.” There was a measure of harshness in her voice, and her eyes – those damned, laser-sharp eyes – seemed to slice straight through him. “Your life has sucked,” she said. “I know it even better than you do. I can see all the shit you can’t remember. The thing is, you’re so used to it suckin’ that you’re afraid to think it’ll ever be otherwise, and life’s too short to be afraid. Even yours.”

“How long do I live?” he asked, morbid curiosity compelling him.

Sharley shook her head. “There’s no one answer to that,” she said. “The future isn’t a set thing. It hinges on the decisions you make, and on what those around you choose. The people who say they can see the future, they’re just seein’ one potentiality and goin’ from there. I see _all_ of ’em. For what it’s worth, I can’t see a single one that goes bad for the two of you, unless you try to talk Marie outta doin’ what she means to. You don’t wanna know what happens to you, if you lose her. What you do.”

 _That_ he could believe. “So what d’you want me to do?” he asked.

“Respect her decision. Support her, you dumbass. She’s afraid you’re not gonna _want_ her around forever, because she’s human and stupid and I don’t know how I ever was one of you.”

“Technically, we’re not human,” Erik supplied. Great, of course he’d been listening in on this, the fucker. “We’re mutants.”

Sharley turned her head, and Logan was deeply satisfied to see that the stare she gave him made him pale. “You and I need to have a discussion about that attitude,” she said. “I like Kitty, and I _don’t_ like what’ll happen to her if you keep on thinkin’ like that. You might have powers the others don’t, but most of you are still made outta tissue paper as far as the universe is concerned. Hell, even Logan here is still actually mortal, for all he’s harder to kill.”

“Thanks for remindin’ me,’ he muttered.

Erik was very still, and Kitty, visibly worried, gave his hand a squeeze. “What do you mean?” he asked.

Sharley snorted. “Dunno if you’ve noticed, but you’ve got a talent for makin’ enemies. You keep this up, not all of ’em will go after _you_ , and there’s too many timelines where they get _her_ instead.”

Kitty made a small _eep_ , but Erik went paler still, and this time Logan couldn’t take any satisfaction from it. No matter how goddamn creepy he found the pair of them, they did seem to genuinely care about one another – and he’d already seen a taste of what Erik might do if he lost her. He didn’t want to see what would happen if she died permanently.

“I could always show you,” Sharley said, “but you’re clingy enough as it is. Just trust me. Doubt you wanna see that again.” She pointed at Kitty’s corpse.

“Um, yeah, _I’d_ rather not see that again, either,” Kitty said, making a face. “Can we maybe not look at it? Because seriously, seeing your own dead body is creepy as fuck.”

Azarael, who had until now remained still and silent as a statue, looked at her. “I have yet to see anyone react positively to it,” he said, completely deadpan. “I would imagine it rather uncomfortable.”

“That’s putting it mildly,” Kitty said, giving Erik’s hand another squeeze. He looked downright ill. “So, if you’re Death, how come you don’t have a scythe? Do you have any, uh, weapon?”

Logan would swear he almost smiled. “I have a sword,” he said. “Sharley does as well, though she seldom uses it. At this rate, she will forget how.”

Sharley flipped him off, a gesture so human that Logan nearly laughed. “Wouldn’t mind that,” she said. “Wish you’d never given me the damn thing.”

“At least I taught you how to use it,” he said. “I would imagine none of you can use a blade, can you? From what I have seen of humanity, in the Other and on Earth, your weapons tend to explode.”

“There’s no kill like overkill,” Kitty said. “Not much can come back after you’ve blown it up. Except maybe Logan, but I doubt even he would survive if you dropped a big enough bomb on him.”

“Thanks,” he said dryly.

“He would not,” Azarael said, with an ease and a surety that was downright unsettling. “I will spare you the details of what would happen.”

“Thank you,” Kitty said, making a face. 

Erik, Logan was sure, probably had some sort of retort on the tip of his tongue, but he had no chance to speak it. Something slammed into the ship, hard enough that the very floor beneath their feet shuddered. The ship didn’t actually lurch, but Logan suspected that was only because it was so damn big.

“Son of a…you all, stay here,” Jary ordered. “Sharley, Az, c’mon.”

“The hell was that?” Marie asked. She’d grabbed one of the bunks, gripping it as though afraid the ship might shatter apart around them.

“You know how I said most of the things over the Edge stay there? Well, _most_ was the operative word. The ones that don’t are why the ships are up here to begin with.”

Marie paled, but Kitty looked worryingly intrigued. Logan himself wasn’t about to be left below, but he’d be damned if that little mischief-maker would be headed up, too.

“No,” Erik said flatly, frowning down at her.

“Oh, come on,” she said, her tone almost a whine. “I’m already dead, aren’t I? Besides, there’s no way Logan’s staying down here.”

“Don’t drag _me_ into this,” he said, but he met Jary’s stare, which was both challenging and mildly exasperated.

“Oh, come on then,” she sighed. “But don’t let one of those things drag you off, or even your healing won’t save you. Kitty, if you really need to help so much, go help man the guns. Erik, I’d tell you to help her, but you’re way too tall.”

“I’ll go with her,” Marie said. She was still pale, but Logan recognized the determined glint in her eyes. She wouldn’t be put off.

“What are the odds of us…crashing? Sinking?” Erik asked. He’d grabbed Kitty’s shoulder, apparently unwilling to let her go haring off just yet.

Jary snorted. “Kid, I’ve been flying one of these for a thousand years, through worse wars than you can imagine, and I’ve never crashed once. Stay below deck and you’ll be fine.” Her tone was even more reassuring than her words, but a second crash undid some of its effectiveness. Whatever was attacking them clearly meant business, but then, Logan wouldn’t expect anything else from a creature of this goddamn hellhole of a world.

Azarael had already taken off, with a creepy silence that told Logan just where Sharley had got that ability. Sharley herself gestured to Kitty, who ducked Erik’s grip. “Come on,” she said. “I’ll show you where the guns are.” She gave Erik a sharp, speculative look. “You mess with metal, right? You come on with me. If these things’re what I think they are, they’ve got a shit-ton of iron in their blood. Kinda curious to see what you can do to ’em.”

“Don’t die,” Kitty ordered. “Like I said, there’ll be peeing on your grave, and you won’t like it.”

Sharley choked back a laugh, but Jary didn’t bother trying. “He’ll be fine,” she said. “Go, both of you – and you,” she added, pointing to Erik’s elder self. “Make yourself useful. As for you two, don’t you dare try to get in those critters’ heads. They’ll tear your mind apart like tissue paper.”

“Not a warning we need,” the young Charles said. In spite of the sudden commotion, he seemed far more fascinated with his elder self’s sudden mobility. True, the elder Professor probably couldn’t make it more than ten feet without assistance, if even that, but Logan could still understand why the young Charles would find it much more compelling even than some sort of aerial attack.

“Good,” Sharley said. “Nice to deal with a telepath who isn’t a stubborn-ass bastard.”

There had to be a story behind that, and Logan wanted to hear it, whenever they actually had time. Before he could follow her, however, Marie grabbed his hand. “You don’t die, either,” she ordered. “I might not pee on your grave, but I’ll still make you pay for it.”

“That,” he said, “I don’t doubt. Don’t worry, darlin’ – I’m not goin’ anywhere except up top.”

“You’d better not,” she warned. “Kitty, I’m goin’ with you. Might as well do somethin’ useful myself.”

“Us?” Anathea asked. Christ, Logan had all but forgot they were there, they’d been so quiet.

“You stay, too,” Jary said. “Need to talk to you later.”

That would be a neat trick, considering nobody was fluent with their language but them. Still, it wasn’t Logan’s problem. He followed Sharley, careful not to step on Kitty as she practically bounced with glee. She was so manic that he wondered if dying had scrambled her brain a little.

A glance at Erik suggested he was wondering the same thing. He was watching Kitty with concern, even as they all flattened themselves against the walls. The child-crew came thundering past in small groups, moving with a confidence and a precision that made him think they did this quite often.

They’d only traversed a few hallways when something else made the ship shudder – something much louder than whatever the hell was attacking them. A deep, thundering boom cracked the air, so loud that Logan found himself momentarily deafened. It was followed by another, and another, traveling in a line – if this was what Jary meant by guns, he didn’t want to know what else she had at her disposal.

“Is _that_ what I get to help with?” Kitty asked, shouting to be heard over the din of the passing crew. The excitement in her eyes bordered on unholy, but then, Logan couldn’t fault her for it. His blood had always pumped before a battle of any kind, but this was different – there was a sort of anticipation, of downright _glee_ , that he’d never felt before.

He looked behind him, and found Marie had a similar expression. Her pallor had given way to a flush of exhilaration, and they hadn’t even reached the fighting itself.

Jary laughed. “You bet your ass it is.” She nabbed a passing crewmember, a boy of maybe ten. “Take them to the guns, okay? And don’t let anybody lose an eye this time.”

 _That_ wasn’t exactly encouraging – but then, it wasn’t as though she couldn’t fix it if anybody did.

Erik looked like he wanted to say something about that, but the boy, Kitty, and Marie were gone before he could so much as open his mouth.

“Don’t worry,” Jary said. “They’ll be fine. Crew’ll look after them.”

Logan supposed they didn’t have any choice but to trust her. She hadn’t fucked them over so far, and he doubted she was going to.

Shoving their way to the deck wasn’t easy. He didn’t know just how many crewmembers this damn ship had – there seemed to be no end to them, trampling through carrying strange weapons and what he’d swear were more than a few home-made bombs. He wondered, not for the first time, just what kind of world they’d really landed in.

When they finally reached topside, he found the air had somehow grown even hotter, with wind like something straight out of an oven blasting over the deck and through the spars. Incredibly, there were crew among them, rolling up the sails even as they were dive-bombed by…something.

Never in his life had Logan seen anything like them – not even in his nightmares. They were vaguely pterodactyl-shaped, but far bigger than anything that could have ever lived on Earth. The one nearest was the size of a goddamn jumbo-jet; its clawed feet could easily have picked up a city bus. Just what in mother fuck was _he_ supposed to do against something like that?

Another volley of shots exploded from the side of the ship, tearing one of the things to shreds. There were at least three that he could see, and he could hear at least one more soaring beneath the ship, great wings flapping. Why was it –

The ship lurched violently to the right, drawing a chorus of screams from the spars – but they were cries of anger, not fear, and were mingled with not a little swearing. The thing underneath had flown straight up and slammed the bottom of the ship, hard enough to actually tilt even such a massive craft. Logan, normally so sure on his feet, lost his balance entirely, and only avoided slamming onto the deck by driving his claws into the wall behind him. Both Magnetos, he noticed sourly, managed to stay upright, no doubt using whatever metal was in the ship to keep their footing.

Jary tapped him on the shoulder, and pointed to the line of rope strung all around the railings. “Grab them if you need them,” she said. “Things are gonna get rough.”

“This isn’t rough?” he demanded. Her answering smile made his stomach drop.

“You haven’t seen ‘rough’ yet. You see the big black things along the rail? They’re guns. Once the rest of those kids get down off the spars, I need you all to do whatever you can with them.”

Well, at least he had a job. He scrambled for the railing as soon as the ship righted itself, grabbing the lifeline and hauling himself toward one of the guns. He would have expected something old-fashioned like a cannon, something that would at least look like it belonged on such a weird ship, but no – this was something unknown to him, sleek and modern and oddly light. It looked simple enough to use, at least, with a large black lever that he suspected was some kind of safety –

The ship lurched again, but not from any outside impact. His stomach lurched with it, gravity seeming to go on vacation as the bow pointed downward at an almost ninety-degree angle. It curved starboard, creaking and groaning in a way that was downright terrifying – they’d picked up speed with an abruptness that told him the ship didn’t just rely on sails for momentum.

He looked behind him and found Jary at the massive wheel, mouth curved in a savage smile. She might claim she’d never crashed the ship, and he hoped she really did know what the fuck she was doing.

Another volley of shots ripped through one of the things, and it let out the most ungodly screech he’d ever heard. It seemed to tear straight through his brain, high and unearthly and so loud he’d swear he could feel it in his teeth. A horrible stench wafted up on the wind, so strong and so foul he almost gagged. It stank like decay, like hundreds of rotted bodies left to lie there on a scorching summer day, but there was more than that – it was a smell so alien that it actually made his head hurt, as well as his stomach threaten mutiny. 

_I don’t have time for this shit_ , he thought, fiddling with the safety lever until it clicked. Hopefully that was all he needed to do, or he’d spend the entire battle fucking around with his weapon and accomplishing nothing.

He must have done _something_ right, because a strange, electrical whine traveled through it, leaving the dark metal warm and vibrating beneath his hands. Fuck yes. He probably shouldn’t be looking forward to using it as much as he did, but whatever. This was actually going to be fun.

\--

Erik had been purposefully avoiding his elder self ever since he and the older Charles had arrived. Part of it had been intentional, but even his subconscious was wary of going near this man who had failed so spectacularly at everything they both held dear. Knowing that his future self had accomplished nothing was one thing – seeing the man was quite another. Clearly he was a survivor, no matter what his age, but there was a certain level of ‘there but for the grace of God go I’ about the whole thing.

At least his elder self seemed equally uncertain. They exchanged a glance, silently assuring one another that they’d do what they could, and parted ways. Unlike Logan, they could use the ship’s metal to ground themselves – and there was a surprising amount of it, for all the thing looked to be constructed out of wood. The entire hull was reinforced with something, though he couldn’t tell what it was just by the feel of it. 

Even stranger was the blood of these…things. There was in fact quite a lot of iron, but it flowed alongside some other thing, a slimy toxin that seemed to poison the metal itself. The very feel of it made him shudder, but he felt it out anyway, traced its passage through the monstrous collection of veins. The sheer size of the thing meant it took longer than he liked, but he wasn’t going to let it know what he was doing until it would be too late for it to fight. While it might be too dumb an animal to be able to feel his interference, he wasn’t about to bet his life on that.

A wave of some unbearable stench drifted over him, and he almost gagged. The guns – cannons – whatever they were, were tearing the things apart, but there were always more, diving and shrieking, their great wings fanning the wind as monstrous talons tried and failed to grab the spars. Jary, whatever else she might be, knew how to handle her ship – it twisted and turned in way such a large craft simply should not be capable of. Then again, the thing shouldn’t be airborne in the first place; its maneuverability really was secondary to the fact that it could fly at all.

But there – _there_ – he had it now, had every ounce of that noxious, liquid metal in his grasp. Tracing it had broken his concentration somewhat, left him grabbing at a lifeline in an attempt to actually stay on the ship, but he had the thing, and all he had to do now was pull with all his might. The disgusting things might be made of gristle and tough hide, but the force of his exertion ruptured veins and blood vessels alike, the metal-rich liquid answering his call and racing toward his outstretched hand.

He hadn’t quite known what would happen, and so was unpleasantly surprised when the entire creature more or less exploded. Though he released his grip on the iron-laced fluid, he still had to dodge as it flowed toward him like the universe’s most noxious wave, splattering on the deck with a disgusting, vaguely squishy sound that he would probably never forget, though God knew he’d try. While he evaded the brunt of it, his shoes and pants still wound up splashed with gore that looked black in the dull red light.

Now Erik _did_ gag, unable to help himself, though at least he avoided being sick all over the deck. It was a very near thing, but somehow he swallowed his nausea, shutting his eyes for a moment as he fought for equilibrium both physical and mental.

“Nice!” Jary called, and when he opened his eyes, he found her giving him a brief but impressed glance. “Now keep that up.”

The thought of doing that again was almost more than he could bear, but it wasn’t as though he had much choice. Part of him, the part not still desperately trying to hold down his gorge, wondered just what in the hell Azarael was doing. He was Death, wasn’t he? Surely he could take care of this without anyone’s help.

He staggered as the ship dove again, and an icy hand closed around his left arm. He twitched, a strange, instinctive revulsion jagging through him – but when he went to jerk away, he found that it was only Sharley. Her expression was one he couldn’t have read even if he’d bothered trying.

“Az doesn’t work like that,” she said, steadying his footing with a strength that was extremely unnerving. Yes, she was a tall woman, but she jerked him upright as though he weighed no more than a child. Somehow, quiet though her voice was, he could hear her quite well over the din of the guns. “Not anymore. The last time he mass killed anything without his sword, he made the Memories. I don’t think we want that here.”

Erik shuddered. No, no he didn’t – but a morbid part of him wanted the story behind it. “And how can he use that sword, if they aren’t coming near enough to the deck?” he asked.

She gave him a little smile. It was not a nice expression, but neither was it wholly malicious. “Trade secret,” she said. “That’s a pretty damn neat trick you’ve got. Think you can do it again?”

Honestly, he wasn’t entirely sure. His mutation was extremely powerful, and in terms of scope, he’d done far more, but that odd, insidious toxin had somehow taken an actual toll on him, though he hadn’t physically touched it. He wondered how his elder self was faring, though there was no time to ask. “I don’t know,” he said, for once completely honest. Somehow, he didn’t think there was much point in lying to Sharley. “There is…something unnatural about them.”

This time, her smile held actual amusement, though it was dark and twisted. “They came from over the Edge,” she said. “There’s nothin’ at all natural about ’em. Come with me – you can gimme a hand, and I can keep you from knockin’ yourself out from exhaustion. I won’t let you fall.”

She took his hand, and he recoiled before he could help it. Erik had experienced and endured many horrible things over the course of his life, but somehow, Sharley’s touch was worse even than the Memories. While he sensed no evil in her, the dead chill of her skin was so alien, so _wrong_ , that he wondered if anyone in this world or any other could stand it.

Sharley gave him a look that was half amused and half exasperated. “I get that a lot,” she said, “but if you don’t want to go flyin’ over the side, you’ll deal with it. I think you’ll live.”

He was sure he would, but he was equally sure he wasn’t going to enjoy this a bit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, the joys of life in the Other – though at least it’s temporarily shelved some hard decisions and total awkwardness. Kitty and Marie are having far more fun belowdecks, at least. And it’s only a matter of time before Hank, Clarice, and Raven turn up, just to add to the fun.


	46. Aerial Battles, Flying Monsters, and Stinky, Stinky things

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's this -- an udate? After all this time? Between a nasty case of the flu, and attempting to help my ex's _other_ ex take him to court (long story), I haven't had a lot of time to write, and when I have, I've often been stuck. I know where I want to take the story, but I was having a difficult time figuring out how to get it there.

Paintball had nothing on this.

The ship’s so-called ‘guns’, Kitty found, were far more like rocket launchers. Each pointed through an old-fashioned porthole, but they were extremely maneuverable, and lighter than they looked. But then, they’d have to be, considering the crew were all children.

Jary hadn’t been kidding, when she said Erik was too tall to help out in here. Kitty was quite small for an adult, but the gunnery compartments were cramped even for her. Each compartment was like a tiny room, little more than a cube that opened out onto a long hallway, and the crew that ran about had to hop over Marie’s legs as they passed. Thus far, nobody had actually tripped, despite the sheer volume of traffic.

The guns themselves were dauntingly complex, with rows of buttons and switches that looked high-tech even to Kitty’s eyes. Fortunately, she didn’t seem to need any of its other features – and oh, she wondered just what those might be – because at this point, blunt force was their best option.

“Reload!” The word came through the small plastic ear-piece she’d been given, that kept threatening to fall out every time she turned her head. Like everything else, it was designed for someone even smaller than her.

She turned, and immediately cracked her head against the wall. There was a large slot beside the gun, almost as long as her forearm and much wider, into which she had to stuff the ammunition. _What_ it was, she wasn’t sure – far too small to be an actual missile, yet it exploded with the force of an ICBM. She was half afraid she’d be deafened for life at this rate.

And yet, powerful though the guns were, it took the entire row of them to take down even one of the…creatures. They weren’t just huge, they were, to her eye at least, unnaturally tough – and if they felt any kind of pain, it only made them more violent. She jammed another round into her gun, swearing all the while, and shoved her hair out of her face.

“Aim!”

That was something of a tricky proposition, considering how damn _fast_ the things were. Nothing that size should be able to move with such speed, or be capable of dodging as effectively as they did. Kitty had wasted her first four shots, until she figured out how to gauge their movements. She bit the inside of her cheek, swiveling her gun to track the monster’s movement.

“Fire!”

Pulling the trigger – well, pushing the button – filled her with an unparalleled glee. The gun had surprisingly little recoil for its power, barely jumping in her hands, and she let out a cackle when her missile hit home.

Unfortunately, this one was close enough to the ship that its blood sprayed all along the side. A giant blob of something the color and consistency of tar came sailing through the porthole, splatting on the wall behind her – she was lucky it hadn’t hit her full in the face. Good grief, it _reeked_ , the stench filling up the little compartment like a solid thing.

Kitty gagged, drawing the collar of her shirt up over her nose. From the disgusted cries rising from the compartments around her, she wasn’t the only one who’d received a surprise shower, and it was nice to know she wasn’t alone. 

An ungodly shriek tore straight through her brain, far louder than any cry the creatures had yet produced. This wasn’t a sound of anger, or even of simple pain – it was brief, but it was composed of two parts surprise and one part total agony. It had come from far above them; whatever had caused it, it hadn’t been the gunnery crew.

An absolute waterfall of that dark, stinking blood flowed down past the portholes, glinting dully in the red light. It was followed immediately by pieces – very _small_ pieces – of shredded black skin, and the better part of a severed wing.

“What in the shit – ”

Another scream – and even more blood – and something shuddered within Kitty’s chest. It was as if, for just a moment, she’d had two hearts, one of which was trying to jerk its way out of her ribcage. Her vision swam, her head suddenly so light that she thought she might pass out. 

She blinked hard, trying to force her mind to focus. Now was not the time to keel over, dammit. But, though her consciousness re-oriented itself, her vision remained…off. The flying things seemed to shiver as they soared, their movements oddly, unnaturally jerky. It was like Time had fallen out of tempo, just a fraction – oh. That was probably Sharley, but why the hell could Kitty sense it? 

_Probably because of the whole ‘dead’ thing_ , she thought, shaking her head in a vain effort to clear it. She jammed another cartridge into the hole in the floor, but another wave of dizziness hit her, a vertigo that had nothing to do with the frankly insane maneuvering of the ship.

_Find Sharley._

Where the thought had come from, she didn’t know, nor did she have the clarity of mind to question it. She sat up, cracked her head on the ceiling, swore, and fell over. After a moment of dazed incomprehension, she tried again, and this time succeeded in squirming back out into the hallway.

“Where are you goin’?” Rogue asked, backing out of her own compartment. It had been a long while now since Kitty had seen her look so…well, pleased. Clearly, Kitty wasn’t the only one who had been enjoying herself, if Rogue’s flushed face and glittering eyes were anything to go by. Her expression was a touch worried, however.

“Sharley,” Kitty said – the only word she was capable of forcing out. Standing, it felt like the floor would drop away at any second, and that she’d go floating off into space when it did.

“Kitty, it’s not safe up there,” Rogue protested. “That’s why we’re down here in the first place.”

“Dead, remember?” Kitty retorted, flinching when another volley fired out from the guns. “I just…need Sharley. To find Sharley.”

Rogue frowned. “I’m goin’ with you. Don’t you dare argue with me,” she added.

Kitty might have done just that, if she’d had the mental capacity to try. Since she didn’t, she settled for ooching her way down the hallway, carefully stepping around the prone gunners and trying not to flip ass over teakettle as the ship dove again. It did her disoriented head no favors at all, but somehow she reached the T-junction that led to emptier corridors. Rogue was on her like white on rice, clearly expecting her to keel over at any moment. It made her wonder if she looked as strange as she felt.

“Why the hell d’you need Sharley?” Rogue asked, slamming into the wall as the ship jerked a hard right.

“I just do, okay? I can’t explain it.” Kitty flailed, grabbing one of the light fixtures in a vain attempt to keep her balance. How in the hell did the crew manage to do anything in a battle? From what she’d seen, they all went barefoot. At this rate, she’d be lucky if she even made it to the deck, let alone found Sharley. Still, for whatever goddamn reason, it had to be done. She was sure of it.

\--

The others might be having fun, but Charles the Younger was emphatically not – nor did he think anyone else in the infirmary was.

As even the brakes on his wheelchair were useless at the moment, Anathea and her crew had helped him onto one of the beds, which he clung to like a remora. His elder self did the same, because even with working legs, it was impossible to actually remain standing with the ship doing…whatever the hell it was doing. Jary might claim she’d never crashed, but if this was how she normally drove, Charles had to wonder _how_.

Some of Anathea’s group weren’t quite so fortunate – both Janek and Irena had gone flying like bowling pins, Janek slamming into the wall and Irena flipping over the examination table. Charles didn’t think he needed to understand their language to be certain they were both swearing. He couldn’t exactly blame them, either.

“How long do you suppose this will last?” he asked, of no one in particular.

“Not much longer, I hope,” his elder self said, sounding unusually strained. “I wish I knew just what was attacking us.”

Privately, Charles was somewhat glad he _didn’t_ know, because he was quite sure it was something terrifying, and that would be best not contemplated. He only hoped that the others were all right – yes, even Erik. It was growing ever more difficult to hate him, to Charles’s secret annoyance. A childish part of him didn’t want to forgive Erik, but he was beginning to do so anyway. Dammit.

He cast his mind afield, heeding Jary’s warning to stay away from the minds of the…creatures. He needed to know what was going on out there, even if there was nothing he could do about it.

_Logan’s mind was easy to find, as his mutation made it somewhat different from everyone else’s. He at least was having a good time, gleefully blasting away at the creatures with some sort of gun attached to the railing. His level of enjoyment was almost disturbing, bordering on outright mania. Even the stench of the things’ blood couldn’t dampen his enthusiasm, no matter how badly it assaulted his sinuses._

_The elder Erik had stationed himself near Jary, drawing on her strength each time his own flagged – smart, Charles thought. While he was not having fun, he wasn’t afraid, either; his irritation was so palpable that Charles almost laughed._

_His younger self was another story entirely. He was with Sharley, a fact that was obscurely alarming, standing on the upper deck away from the crew and their guns._ His _mind…what on Earth had happened to him? Had Sharley done something? Charles still had no idea just how much telepathic influence the woman did – or did not – have over human beings. He was focused to a truly unnatural degree; not a stray thought in his head, his senses spread in a way he simply should not be capable of. There was a level of revulsion beneath it all, but that was easily explained by Sharley’s hand on his arm. Charles was ashamed to admit it, because it was entirely unfair, but for some reason Sharley’s touch was beyond horrible. Clearly Erik agreed, but he was drawing something from her, something quite unlike what his elder self took from Jary._

_He was latched onto the metal in one of the creatures’ blood, and the strange, nauseatingly alien feel of it was almost enough to drive Charles away. He had never piggy-backed his telepathy onto Erik’s ability, and so had no idea what it ordinarily felt like, but Erik himself certainly knew the difference. It was sheer stubbornness that kept him going, and Charles didn’t want to stick around long enough to know what he’d do next._

_Marie, like Logan, was easy to find, and she was currently worried in a way that had nothing to do with the battle outside. She was following Kitty, or trying to; the pair of them were suffering the same problems as everyone in the infirmary, unable to make it three steps without running into something – usually the walls, but occasionally each other. She had no desire to go topside, but Kitty was determined, and Marie wasn’t about to leave her friend alone._

_Charles admired her loyalty, but it was foolish. Kitty was already dead, and theoretically past harm – but even with Logan’s mutation, Marie was vulnerable. At least she knew it – unlike Logan, she wasn’t going to go and use her body as a meat shield. She’d hesitate, rather than throw herself at whatever threat might crop up, but that too might cost her. Thank God they had Jary, because if anything happened to Marie, Logan might try to kill the entire crew._

_Kitty didn’t seem worried about a damn thing, but that was simply because her mind was wholly taken up with a single thought: find Sharley. He could find no context for the thought, no reason she should be so driven, but the compulsion was so strong that he didn’t think he could stop it, even though he probably should._

_None of their minds indicated that the battle would be over any time soon. Though they’d killed several of the creatures, at least three more remained, and they were smart enough to remain out of range of the ship’s guns, hunting for weak points in the defenses. Charles doubted they would find any, but there were likely other ways for them to do damage – repeatedly attacking the keel seemed to be the favorite of at least one of them. He could only hope it was reinforced strongly enough to deal with such massive blows._

Well, wasn’t this just brilliant. At least he hadn’t been sick yet.

\--

Erik was quite surprised to find that he was, in fact, enjoying himself.

Oh, Sharley’s hand on his arm was little short of horrifying, and the feel of the creatures’ blood was nauseating as ever, but he was having fun nonetheless. Not since before he’d gone to prison had he had a real chance to use the full scope of his own ability, and there was something euphoric in doing so now. Sharley was not, he was certain, augmenting his power in any way, but she was giving him _something_ , something that made him far more aware of his own gift that he’d been in years. Once this was over, he’d have to ask her just what the hell she’d done to him.

Not that she wasn’t busy herself. She moved very little, but the things were…jerking, somehow; shuddering as they flew in a way that couldn’t possibly be natural, and he was quite sure it was her doing. She did, after all, control Time in some fashion, and he assumed she was doing so now, because they looked out-of-sync in a way he couldn’t hope to describe.

“Yank that thing already, will you?” she asked, still quite audible even over the otherwise deafening screeches and explosions.

_That’s what she said_ , he thought. He wasn’t ready to ‘yank’, as she put it – he didn’t fully have the blood under his control, but she presumably knew what she was doing.

It hurt, but that wasn’t surprising. The pain was bearable, and not nearly enough to keep him from dodging out of the way as a huge chunk of the thing crashed down onto the deck. Surely such an impact should have at least dented the wood, but the bloody limb splattered as though it had been dropped on solid rock.

The stench was enough to make him gag again, almost choking on bile, and Sharley gave him a sympathetic look. “Almost done,” she said. “I’ll get this next one. You try not to yarf your guts all over the deck. It’s gross enough as it is.”

That was easier said than done. It was suddenly all Erik could do to stay on his feet, but he wasn’t about to collapse in front of this odd woman. Why was this taking such a toll on him? Was the strange toxin in the creatures’ blood really so terrible? He had an unfortunate suspicion that the answer was a very big yes.

He watched Sharley, whose focus was so intent that he was glad it wasn’t fixed on him. She’d raised one scarred hand, fingers twining through something he couldn’t see, that laser-stare so sharp he was surprised it didn’t slice the soaring monstrosity in half. When her fingers closed into a fist, something in the air made him shudder, and he had to force himself not to stagger backward.

The sky above them…shivered, shifting briefly into a pixelated nightmare that turned the smooth flight of the creature into a jerking St. Vitus dance of struggling wings and thrashing claws. Parts of it began to crumble; in others, the leathery skin stretched and snapped, spilling its stinking guts. It shrieked all the while, flailing, trying to ascend, but something held it fast, trapping it like a moth in a bottle, until it collapsed in on itself with a squish and a truly horrible tearing sound.

Sharley lowered her hand as the remains fell to the deck, and when Erik looked at her face, he wished he hadn’t. There was no expression at all upon it – no satisfaction, nor fear nor disgust. Once more, she might as well have been a statue, and it made her seem more alien than ever. Though he knew she was no threat to him, he had to swallow a sudden, violent surge of pure terror. Kitty had better be able to leave, and she had better _want_ to leave, because there was no way he could live in this world, with things like Sharley and those flying monsters.

Sharley looked at him, and now a little animation did enter her face. “Think we’re almost done,” she said, giving his shoulder a slightly awkward pat, and it occurred to him that she didn’t like touching people any more than they liked touching her. That was actually obscurely comforting.

“Ow! Son of a biscuit-eating cheeseburger.”

“You’re the one who wanted to come up here, you lunatic.”

Erik could barely make out the words over the thunderous blasts of the guns, but he knew the voices very well: for whatever insane reason, Kitty and Marie had decided to come topside. When he turned, he found both of them struggling to grip the life-line along the rail, bent nearly double as they crept forward. Marie looked exasperated and more than a little nervous, but Kitty’s expression was one of single-minded determination.

“What in _hell_ are you doing out here?” he demanded, trying to shout loudly enough to actually be heard.

“I had to find Sharley!” Kitty replied, though the sentence was almost drowned out by the death-screech of one of the other creatures. “I don’t know why, but I had to.” She yelped when the ship pitched again, gripping the rope so tightly her knuckles turned white.

Sharley gave her a sharp look, but it had nothing on the glance she gave Marie, who gulped. There was nothing at all malicious in Sharley’s scrutiny, but the intensity of it could have made anyone squirm.

“Well, you weren’t wrong,” she said. “Once this is over, we need to go get the rest of you people. Haven’t seen Time-lines like yours in ages. This’ll get…interestin’.”

“Should I be worried?” Marie asked, all but petrified.

“ _You_ don’t need to be,” Sharley said, sounding unnecessarily cryptic to Erik’s ears. “You get on down below, and try to come up with a better argument to throw at that stubborn-ass bastard of a boyfriend you’ve got. Hate to say this, but you and Kitty need to stay away from each other for a while, just to be safe. Kitty, it’s my dad you need, not me – you c’mon with me and I’ll take you to him.”

Erik didn’t like the sound of that at all, but he knew better than to say anything. He had no desire to get smacked, even if by someone as small as Kitty. She actually gave Sharley a salute.

“Where’s Logan?” Marie asked, gripping the line and swallowing hard. She was trying to appear calm, he was sure, but she was utterly failing.

“Havin’ the time of his life down lower,” Sharley assured her. “Don’t you worry about him. Erik, you look ready to drop dead, so you go on with Marie. I’ll send Logan your direction once this bullshit’s over.” She grabbed Kitty’s hand – who didn’t flinch, Erik noticed – and led the woman off, carefully keeping her upright.

“Oh joy,” Erik deadpanned. He really didn’t want to be around Logan and Marie while they bickered over the merits of Sharley’s offer. Were he in Logan’s shoes, he would have jumped on it in a heartbeat, but he strongly suspected Logan had a deeply-buried martyr complex that conspired to make certain he was never truly happy.

Marie looked somewhat exasperated as well, and Erik wondered if she too was aware of it. If she was to ever have any peace, she would have to bludgeon that flaw out of Logan – possibly literally. Erik was not at all ashamed to admit to himself that he would like to watch -- just at a more appropriate time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Erik is not entirely wrong about Logan's martyr complex, which might, in a world as dangerous as the Other, bite him in the ass later. The fact that the ship is shortly going to grab everybody still left on Earth won't help at all.


End file.
